Single Mother of Four
by Babyuknowme13
Summary: Leola means Lionness, well this teen had runaway from home when she came across four turtle infants. Now with some new surprises she's trying to make their house a home, except she's never known one before. This is her story on the Long Road to Nowhere at all. How can she change things? And when it hits the fans can she protect them? She'll soon see, she's making it up as she goes.
1. Long Road to Nowhere At All

She'd run away from home at fifteen because of a drunk dad and a missing mom. One day she ducks into the sewers to avoid some police, trying to return her to her dad. There, she sees four baby turtles and a rat, and from there she becomes a mother of four. Her dad always did say she'd wind up as a teenage mom. When she woke up the next day to find the turtles twice their size, she doubted he'd meant anything quite like this.

A/N: Saw a fic like this and wanted to put my own spin on things. I think turtle tots are absolutely adorable!

Chapter 1: The Long Road to Nowhere At All.

Leola fast-walked down the street, taking a left turn into an alley to avoid a man in uniform. Apparently she had angered some higher diety though, because he'd spotted her retreat and made his way over to what he knew was a dead end alley.

Leola cursed in german and tried to find a place to hide. There weren't any fire escapes on this side of the building, but there was a manhole cover. As horrible as the idea of the sewers was, going back to her father would be a hundred times worse. So she lifted the metal cover, climbed down, and pulled it back over just as the policeman entered the mouth of the back alley.

It stank, and she tried to hold her breath as she walked down the corridors. She was infinitely grateful for the water proof boots she wore as she stepped through things she refused to identify. Other than her brown boots, she wore blue skinny jeans and an over-sized mountain dew T-shirt.

On her back was her school bag, which held three changes of clothes, ball shoes, a loaf of bread, peanut butter, jelly, fifty bucks, a half used photo album, and half a dozen feminine supplies and toiletries. Everything the teenaged runaway needed to survive on the streets, particularly if that same runaway was a high school drop out and on the run from the police.

The half-german teen sniffed, shuddering at the smell of rancid _leavings_ as she sloshed her way down a long tunnel. There was light from the grates to see by, even if it cast eerie shadows from the pipes and the rats running across them reminded her of creatures from horror movies.

"Well, you've gotten yourself in a right old gerkin." She scolded herself weakly.

The sewers weren't half bad, once she learned to ignore the smells. Some pipes were large enough to sleep in, and she gladly took advantage of this fact. The next day, she made her self aa sandwhich and continued the march. What she was looking for, she didn't know. All she wanted was a place that she could stay for longer than a night with people who wanted her there.

Some nights she spent at the dump, just for a change of pace. Her blonde hair she kept short so it could be easily washed in a gas station bathroom. Her clothes got washed at any laundromat she happened to pass when they were dirty. Her fifty bucks just stretched until all she had was ten.

October first is a day she would come to view as the best in the year, tromping her birthday and christmas with no trouble at all. It was the day she became a single mother of four. It was a big step on this long road to nowhere at all.

The sewers were a refuge from the crisp day above. The closeness of the walls and the smell gave the impression that they were actually much warmer. Wearing a thick hoodie to hold in further warmth helped, and she swore that when she could afford one it'd be the first thing she bought.

POV Change.

It was getting into the afternoon, somewhere around two or three. I walked in relative silence, occasionally whistling or humming a tune. I didn't have any set destination in mind, I just didn't want to be sitting around all day. So instead I walked, slowly working out a map of the sewers in relation to streets.

Then I heard the sound of cracking glass somewhere to my right. Unfortunately gifted with a natural curiosity, I followed the sound and came across an amusing sight. One I sincerely wished I owned a camera to capture and put in my album, but I've pretty much burned the memory into my brain anyway.

There was a rat, trying to put four turtles covered in a green slime into an empty coffee can. The breaking glass I figured out was some kind of canister, with TCRI on the side.

Mister Rat saw me and froze, showing himself to be a credit to his race by not abandoning the little turtles. For a moment, all I could do was stare, and then I knelt down to make myself seem less giant.

"You're a very strange rat, aren't you?" I half expected an answer. Of course, if I had gotten one at that time I probably would have turned and started walking in the opposite direction at a very controlled but tense pace.

He decided that I wasn't going to try to take his dinner (At least I assumed at the time the turtles were dinner) and began trying to pull the can away. He wasn't making much progress though, and he couldn't tip it on it's side and roll it because then the turtles would fall out. So, since he'd already proven to be a very strange rat, I decided to offer my assistance.

"Do you want some help? I could carry it for you." Why was I asking a rat if it needed help taking home the groceries?

Yet, this time he did answer, albeit in his own way. He looked at me, then the turtles, turned his head to look down the very long tunnel, back at me. Finally, I spoke again.

"I don't know why I'm talking to you, offering to help. Maybe I'm so desperate for company I've been reduced to talking to animals." I sighed, slumping a bit. I was disappointed, no getting around that. For a moment I had honestly thought I'd be able to help someone, something, other than myself.

That was when the rat darted to me, darted to the can with a significant look, and then walked part way down the tunnel. He turned around and looked at me when I didn't immediatly follow. Well, like I said, I was desperate for company. So I gently picked up the can and started following the rat.

What does it say about me, that I now officially get along better with rats than humans?

He had a pretty nice burrow filled with straw. It was large enough for a fully grown man to sleep inside, and I took a seat and helped the turtles out of the can. They still had some goo on them, so I started wiping it off. I got a fair amount on my hands but at the time didn't think anything of it. How was I to know it was actually a dangerous chemical? As far as I could tell it was the same stuff you put in glo-sticks!

Anyway, I cleaned them off and they slept like tiny rocks in the straw. The rat curled up nearby and there was plenty of room, and I _did_ feel strangely tired. So I laid down with my bag for a pillow and slept.

I could've been imagining it, but I could've sworn I felt four little lumps wriggle closer to me. I _could've_ been imagining it, but I like to think not. October first, it's a day that's made me smile everytime I revisit.

The next morning I gave birth to a litter of kittens right there in the straw. All boys.

"Holy cow!" I whispered. They were about the size of toddlers, but with green skin and shells. Also, the rat.

"Holy _cow!_" I whispered even quieter. It was big enough to _eat_ me!...Okay I'm exaggerating. He was about four feet long, not counting the tail. I guess I wasn't as quiet as I thought I'd been, because he woke up and uncurled. Almost seeming not to notice his increased stature.

"...I didn't think rats grew this big." I mumbled, suddenly wishing he was wearing something. Anything really, even my old mountain dew shirt. I'd be happy to loan it to him so long as he promised not to shed all over it.

Well, it turns out he understood me, because he looked down at himself and gasped in a very _human_ way. His whiskered maw hung open as he realized that now he was big enough to eat the new giant turtles without opening his mouth too wide. Good thing he never really intended them for a snack.

He then compared the turtles and I realized that they were awake too. In fact, the smallest one looked up at me with big watery eyes and made this sad little peeping sound. The others soon picked up the tune and I slowly picked two of them up, trying to get them to stop crying.

"Um, shh...It's okay little guys! Don't cry!" I don't think I was doing a very good job of it, but the rat was studying us and I hoped he could figure out what was wrong. Maybe they just wanted their mommy?

"We must find food for them." And that, ladies and gentlemen, should have been the point where I calmly set down the babies and walk in a controlled but tense manner in the opposite direction. This is when I should've poked my head out of a grate to check for flying pigs. This is when I should've checked my family tree for any relation to Dr. Dolittle.

Instead I said, "I have enough for a medium pizza."

Well, I bought a pepperoni and brought it down. The babies happily set upon it with the rat and myself taking only a single slice each. The biggest one was eating calmly, slowly, watching his brothers. The second biggest was aggresive, shoving the dry-green one to get to the food. The sea-green one, also the smallest, was running around the box, alternating between brushing against his brothers and eating.

This had totally wiped out my piggy bank though. After this there was nothing left in the United banks of Leola. And already I couldn't bare to leave these guys to fend for themselves. Dare I even think it, but maybe I'd found a place that needed me, if just for a little while.

"So, I don't suppose you have a name? I'm Leola." I felt a bit silly introducing myself to a rat. Even a giant _talking_ one. Was I taking this too well? Shouldn't I be curled in the fetal position right now? Maybe I was just weird.

"I am called Splinter, Leola." Good, now I can stop calling him The Rat. It was really very annoying.

"Nice to formally meet you." I quipped, already more preoccupied with trying to coo over all the boys at once. It didn't help that they really soaked it up, smiling up at me with too big eyes that made my icy heart melt. My stone heart was crimbling, leaving behind a nugat center. And I don't even know what nugat is!

"My humble burrow will not be enough for them." Splinter sighed, looking sadly at his pipe. Had to agree there. With everyone the sizes they were it was getting a big cramped. Here I tried not to appear to eager when I voiced another offer of aid. He accepted and we started herding the baby turtles to another part of the sewers, looking for a place to call home.

It took a week to find the perfect place. A week of dumpster diving and scrimping for a bottle of water. I really felt homeless for the first time since I ranaway. I mean stereotypical homeless, not nowhere-to-sleep-tonight homeless. The kind of homeless where you're struggling to feed yourself and you can't seem to get enough.

I'm glad we found a home when we did, and that it had electricity. Three light bulbs hung in one of those little maintanence rooms off to the side, it had a solid door that faded into the stonework in a way that we almost didn't see it. Inside it was pretty obvious that no one had come to call for a while. The dust was so thick, I almost mistook it for a carpet.

Of course, in no time at all I had shoed the boys out and started the painstaking task of sweeping. It took two hours before I deemed it fit for human habitation. I was only half way done, but the boys were tired and we were hungry. So we settled all together on the cold ground, curling together to try to share heat. Splinter's fur is awesome. I wish I had fur.

Well, I got fur. Goes to show that you should always be careful what you wish for.

Remember that glowing green ooze I got all over my hands? Well, at my size it wasn't enough for an instant transformation like the boys, I didn't get enough. Well, apparently it worked slower on me and when I woke up, I had a tail. Also, soft rat-ears the same shade of blonde as my hair.

"I have a tail!?" I couldn't keep quiet about that. I woke up, pushed away the appendage thinking it belonged to Splinter, and was startled out of my mind when _I_ felt it. So I got up, and sure enough, a long sinewy tail

"Miss Leola?" Splinter looked as surprised as me. Neither of us expected me to grow a tail, or silky ears. They really are pretty soft. Like velvet, or what I imagine velvet feels like. I've never touched velvet before.

Of course, when he talked I heard all sorts of echoes. There were sounds all over the place that I couldn't identify. Imagine walking into a rock concert, everyone's screaming and the ramp's on ten. You're sitting between two ramps, and their facing you. Through it all are also these little annoying sounds, the ones people make when they walk and talk and eat. Sounds that when you're trying to listen to music, or trying to sleep, become incredibely annoying. Now imagine that, and then imagine that everything was just fine. You couldn't name all the sounds, but you were immune to headaches!

Now if you can picture all that, you know what it's like to have rat ears. It is not a pleasant experience to wake up too. Even though I was now immune to headaches caused by loud sounds.

And of course, my tail kept swinging in every direction which kept making me stagger like a drunkard. I felt like my father.

"I have a tail, and rat ears! And claws?" The last ones I hadn't noticed until then. My nails had lengthened into bag lady standards and were much stronger than before. After they went past the fingertips they started to curl, and later when I felt a bit better about my circumstances, I tested their sharpness. That wash rag won't bother anyone ever again.

The mutagen had changed me slower than Splinter or the boys, but change me it had. And apparently I had spent too much time around Splinter, or maybe I just wasn't compatible with turtle genes. Whatever the case, tail, ears, and claws.

Tails actually don't affect your center of gravity that much. And humans do still have a tailbone. Something we lost the use of, so it serves as this bump just above the buttcrack. Well, I was using mine. The tail had grown out of it and popped out of the skin there. It was about the same width as three fingers at the base and it went down to a single digit at the tip. It measured to about five feet, so seven inches shorter than my total height.

My normal ears were no more, gone forever. They had lengthened out and gained the ability to flap about, rotating back and forth to catch all these new sounds I was hearing. I checked in a mirror later and when I forcefully held them down, it was hard to tell they were there at all. So long as the pink inside wasn't showing and I kept my hair in place, I looked normal. They'd migrated upwards about an inch or so each and were about the same length as my pinky finger.

Well, I wasn't going to let my new appendage hold me back, so I started the day. The boys sure had a hard time wrapping the tail around their toddler heads, it was fun to see them so confused. Splinter went to forage for food and I resumed cleaning and keeping an eye on the tots. While doing so I explored the changes that came, listing them on a mental T-graph. Points for and points against.

Points against: I keep stepping on my tail when I step backwards, although I suspect eventually I'll stop doing that, it hurts. Every sound from the boys sounded like a thunderclap, so I kept jumping and looking at them expecting to see some giant noisy disaster. I'll have to wear my hoodie every time I go topside now, curling my tail around my stomach to hide it.

Points for: I now have super-hearing, if I learn what all those new sounds are. My tail is a lot more flexible than Splinter's, meaning I can use it to hold things, so it's like a third arm. The claws will be useful to attack anyone trying to mug me.

So it's pretty even, so I'm trying to remain nuetral while learning how to drive this new body. The first step to that, I think, is finding out what all those noises are. The ones I don't think I've ever heard before, along with pinpointing where the further away ones are, and how large is the range.

I went to the dump that day, keeping my ears down and wearing my hoodie. Luckily the weather was getting cold so I wasn't too out of place. Walking through the grounds I claimed six blankets, all nearly threadbare. I found two pillows, which I figured me and Splinter could use since the kids basically used _us_ for pillows. No mattresses though, which would've been awesome.

Carrying everything was a hastle, and it went slow because I kept stopping to try and guess what every sound was. In the middle of the dump was the tiny and quick _pitter-patter_ that I guessed were my distant cousins, or maybe Splinter's brothers. The cloth in my arms rustling sounded like, well, try rubbing you arms slowly and then pour on the volume till it sounded like a tire wheel rubbing concrete.

In the sewers was all the rushing, dripping, _glorping_ of water. And other non-drinkable liquids. It was dizzying and for a full five minutes I got so turned around by the echoes that I couldn't find my way back to our new burrow. I don't think I hear much farther than a human, it's just there's more sounds in the immediate vicinity so it looks like it.

Now I described a few sounds we hear already, but with rat ears there are sounds so high pitched that humans can't hear them at all. I found those out later with Splinter, after I got back with the blankets and stuff.

"Describe these sounds you hear and I will attempt to help you identify them." He said as soon as the kids were asleep. We were sitting facing eachother with a few lit candles, the kids were in an alcove on the left side, when we hung a curtain it's be like a bedroom. On the right was another alcove, and two more on either side further down. One for him, one for me, and one for a kitchenette.

"Well, anytime something moves there's this scratchy sound. Is that just cloth rustling?" I demonstrated by rubbing my thumb and forefinger together to produce the sound.

"Yes, the sound of Movement. If you rub cloth together the sound is softer, yet more pronounced." I tried it out, comparing the slight differences. It was like the skin-on-skin one was hearing two pieces of sand paper rubbing together and cloth-on-cloth was the sound of cats sharpening their claws on a door post. That's the closest comparison.

Normal sounds were a normal level, but the quieter ones I normally dismissed or couldn't hear at all were suddenly there too, and wading through that level of sensory input was hard to get used to. We stayed up for a good hour, me asking about different sounds that I had heard and us both trying to figure out what it was. Sometimes my descriptions weren't very good and we struggled for up to ten minutes once until we figured out that the echoe-y static-y sound was from the same generator that gave us power.

Then there were times when I gave a very brief description, like this pulsing thrum, and he would smile and calmly tell me it was hearbeats. Six of them, four slightly distant ones that even now I strained to hear over the sound of breathing, and two more pronounced ones. Heartbeats.

After a while I slept, but somehow wound up with the tots instead of my own little nest. Splinter did as well. I guess neither of us were ready yet to let them sleep alone, or maybe it was us that needed that closeness. Heaven knows I'd never gotten enough of it in my life.

Two more days passed before Splinter brought back a book on Renassaince artists and we chose names. Leonardo was the largest, seeming oldest. Raphael was the most agressive, because I thought it sounded tough. Donatello sounded nice and thoughtful, with was exactly what that dry-green tot was. Finally the smallest turtle was named Michelangelo, because the others sounded stupid and I didn't want him getting picked on by his brothers. Well, I didn't tell Splinter why I chose that one, I think I told him I just wanted to call him Mikey.

So now they had names, and we made sure they knew them. Pretty soon though I had reverted to using nicknames, you know, Leo, Raphie, Donnie, and Mikey. It made me wish we'd chosen something that could make an ie sound for Leo, since it didn't quite fit with the others'.

I could make a whole new range of noises. And apparently, so could the tots. Sometimes, if Raphie was being too rough, Mikey or Donnie would make this high pitched peeping noise, like a baby bird. The first time I heard that was a day after we'd picked names. Something in me made me rush over from where I'd been setting up a box of refilled water bottles to the 'living room'.

"What's wrong baby? Tell mama!" I crooned until the victim stopped crying and then I would round on Raph, or rarely Leo, and scold them for making their brother cry. Five minutes in the corner, unless they tried moving, then I added five minutes. There wasn't a worse punishment for children anywhere.

The noise would call me from wherever I happened to be in the burrow, and when I tried describing it to Splinter he explained. Apparently rat infants make that same high pitched noise, and the 'mother' always reacted by retrieving the infants to the 'nest'.

That night, when I curled up with the boys and Splinter I lay awake. I listened to their steady breathing, listened to the tiny heartbeats. Mikey was curled into my stomach, one pudgy arm flung over me like I was his favorite teddy. Donnie was cradled by Leo, who looked just adorable hugging his brother. Raphie was covered in blankets but he was close enough to Splinter that his tail had wrapped around the bundle.

My daddy always said I'd wind up one of those down trodden teenage mothers. I don't think this is what he had in mind.

This is my story. This is me on this Long Road to Nowhere at all. I'm making it up as I go, and doing pretty good so far. Someday, maybe my boys will find this journal. They'll figure out the trials and tribulations of being a single mother of four.


	2. A house becomes a home

Chapter 2: A House Becomes A Home.

Every couple days either Splinter or myself brought back something for the house. Splinter brought five sheets home that we used for curtains for the alcoves, making three bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, and a dojo. The next day I brought back eight rolls of mostly used duct tape, a hammer, and a carton half filled with nails, to put them up.

Splinter brought one of those collapsable tables, which I followed up with a grass stained picnic blanket as a table cloth and a vase of fake flowers. The vase was purple, hand painted, with a big ugly crack down one side. On top of that I found two chairs, the next day Splinter brought three.

I began my plumbing project with enthusiasm that quickly fell into despair. Finding a sink wasn't as hard as you might think, there was a dozen of them in the dump, all in decent condition. It was connecting it to a working pipe of clean water that was the problem. It took four weeks to finish since I couldn't find all the parts. The monkey wrench especially was hard to find.

After I had a working sink though, I took a break from the kitchen to help out elsewhere. I packed home a queen sized mattress, which was really hard to get into the sewers. I had to take a huge detour over to the water side where these huge pipes sit and I could pick the locks to get in. I put the padlock back on but left it unlocked, so Splinter could bring his own finds through.

The mattress fit into the boy's room and it was nice to sleep on a bed. Even one stained a nasty looking yellow with a corner missing. The springs creaked like nothing else to my ears and with my light sleeper status I spent long nights lying in the dark and cursing myself for getting such a stupid bed. The boys loved it though, especially when Splinter supplemented pillows for them.

Splinter found an old couch with mismatched cushions and we had to work together to bring it in. We didn't usually leave the boys without supervision if we could help it, but I thought it was worth it. I found a coffee table two nights later that had been left on the street curb. The arm chair was my idea too, since the couch wasn't big enough for all of us comfortably. Splinter repaid my kindness by bringing me a rocking chair.

It had once been painted white, and it must've once had pink hearts or something on it. The paint had flaked off though, and it made that stereotypical creaking noise when I used it. The wood was strong though, and I loved holding one of the boys and telling them a bedtime story. Some nights I held Mike, other's Raph, then Don, then Leo. Mixing it up everynight so no one got two nights in a row.

The dojo was hard to furbish, and for a little while I questioned even having a dojo. I couldn't think of what else to use the space for though, so I merely kept an eye out for sporting equipment.

I was walking the streets one November night, probably the eighth but I didn't keep track. My hoodie held my tail and I was feeling more comfortable about hiding my ears, so I was less careful than usual. I was on the look out for mats, preferably thickish ones. The hard concrete floor needed padding if we were expected to exercise in there.

I saw a store that had gone bankrupt and noticed them packing things into a moving van. I hmmed in thought when I saw them moving out just the kind of stuff I wanted. There was a rack that looked pretty heavy, but would be perfect for Splinter. I wonder why a mutated rat wanted a sports rack though.

"Hey, where's this stuff going to?" I asked one of the movers on break. He was smoking a cigarette and I marvelled at all the ultrasound noises could come from such a simple action.

"Dump, no one bought it." He answered gruffly.

"Can I take something?" I asked. I'd rather not walk all the way to the dump, it was already getting pretty late and I still had to find some food.

"Sure." It didn't matter to them one way or the other. So I climbed into the back of the van to have my pick.

Wrestling mats, loaded before I showed up so I hadn't seen them. I'd been thinking more along the lines of testing the rack to see if I could move it. When I saw the mats though, I didn't care that they were bulky or that it was a long way to any big sewer entrances. I knew I had to have them.

I took five of them, but only because I couldn't carry the rest. I must have looked pretty stupid carrying these things. I'm pretty sure I heard kids snickering at me as I waddled past. Why weren't they at home sleeping? It was getting pretty late, or maybe early. I didn't have a watch.

"Hey lady, what'chu doing with this stuff?" I was walking with the mats on my back, bent over and feeling like a turtle. Bowed over like that I couldn't see who was speaking, but I didn't really want to set the mats down and find out because I knew I'd have trouble picking them back up again.

"Taking it." I answer. I was hot, sweaty, and my tail hurt from being pressed against my body by the mats. I really wanted to get to a secluded place so I could let it out.

"Listen lady, to go down this road you gotta give the Purple Dragons toll." Purple Dragons, don't let the name fool you, typically these guys are just boring boys with nothing better to do. They were actually one of the smaller gangs, and although they were certainly flashy, they weren't all that intimidating.

"Don't got money. I'm homeless." That was a lie. I did have a home, it was about twelve feet downwards, and a bit to the right if I remember correctly. Things look different in the sewer.

"I've had enough of her Jim, let's just take her to an alley." I set down the mats now, to look at them. Four of them, all with dragon tattoos. One had a chain, the others were empty handed but big, the kind of guys who'd make a killing going into wrestling.

"Well, she's alright looking, I guess." 'Jim' shrugs. He was the first one who spoke and the one with the chain. These guys didn't look all that scary, like you imagine a gang to look. If anything they looked bored. And I for one, wasn't up to playing the part of entertainment.

One of them, a big guy, grabbed me and started looking at my chest. Now I was getting scared, so I did what came naturally.

"HIIIEEEP!" He'll be singing castrato for a week. That made his buddies mad though, so they started rushing in. Jim held back though, twirling his chain. I hope he didn't know how to use that too well.

I started running, going back the way I came. They followed, and they were obviously faster than me. Also more stamina, but I guess that came from getting enough to eat every day instead of sacrificing yourself for four turtles.

When I could hear one of the big boys almost panting against my neck, I tripped. Just one second running, the next taking a fall onto concrete. Oh, and did I mention he was too close to slow down? Yeah well, he stepped on me, my tail and back, and went flying. I'm lucky he didn't land on top of me, because then I'd have broken every bone in my body. Somebody had been drinking their milk.

I scrambled up, ignoring the blood from my flayed arms. The second guy tried punching me but by luck I stepped on the first one, who was still on the ground. I fell backwards and reached forward, trying to instinctively stop myself from falling. I ended up taking him with me.

They must have smacked heads or something cause there was this almighty cracking sound that didn't come from me. I got away from the bodies and found Jimbo running at me, swinging his chain.

It felt like someone dislocated my jaw. I was so keyed up that I merely flinched before moving on. I knew I couldn't outrun him, so I charged him instead. He wasn't expecting that. I think most people's reaction is to turn tail and run.

Or maybe it wasn't my charging that he hadn't expected. My ears were up, catching every little sound. My tail had fallen from it's hiding place and though sore, it made a handy tool. I whipped him with it, knocking the chain from his hand just a second before I hit him.

He'd been standing stock still while I'd been accelorating. I read somewhere that when two vehicles collide the faster one comes away with less damage. If that was true then I must've at least knocked the breath out of him.

It took five minutes to find the mats. The first guy I had kicked below the belt was gone, probably home to get an ice pack. I struggled to get my mats on my back again, and began a much slower waddle home. By now, I felt my wounds. Oh boy did I feel them.

From the first fall my forearms were skinned and dripping blood. Dirt and tiny rocks were still in them, I knew I had to wash them as soon as I got home. My knee had been badly jarred too, but it wasn't bleeding. I guess my jeans protected it.

My tail was going to be black and blue along with the normal pink. It hurt all over and I winced and groaned appropriately. No third arm uses for the next few days.

I tested my jaw, opening and closing it, poking it. Not broken, but the metal had cut me and I had a bit of blood dripping off my chin. It didn't seem too bad though, just a nick. I knew half my face was going to be this ugly purple or yellowish color in the morning though.

So I was bruised and battered, but victorious all the same. I waddled home with the spoils of war, feeling pretty good about myself despite my bruises. They way I figured it, taking down four guys at once made me pretty badass.

Splinter didn't agree. Which I kind of figured, but you know, a girl can dream. He had tutted at my scrapes like I imagine normal fathers do to little girls who fall off bikes. I told him what happened but he was so upset over my battle scars that he barely glanced at the mats! After all the trouble I went through for them!

"Splinter, calm down. I've been in fights before." Albeit, not against so many at once. And I had come off worse before. Actually fighting was one of the few things my father approved of, so long as I won. If I lost it was a week without food and an extra strong beating to "toughen me up".

"Miss Leola, perhaps it's not safe for you on the surface. I hadn't thought someone as normal looking as you would be attacked." He suggested. I decided to set him straight.

"Splinter, you can't stop me from going up there. As for getting attacked, it was a gang. They attack anyone they think might have money or something else they want." I said bluntly. He couldn't exactly _force_ me to play stay at home mom. I was going to go topside whether he liked it or not.

He seemed to realize that too, and then he offered me lessons in karate.

Okay it was ninjutsu, but dang it sure did _look_ like karate. He said it was up to me to learn, but that he'd feel better if I could better defend myself. He totally guilt tripped me into it. Not that I've much regretted the decision since. The ability to practically turn invisible is _made_ of awesome.

The mats got a good work out for the first couple weeks. Apparently one of the first lessons of ninjutsu is learning how to fall. How to _fall._ I spent two weeks getting tossed over his shoulder, pushed, shoved, tripped, and various other methods used to make me temporarily airborne. And he made me practice twice a day, although extra sessions were encouraged.

So now I had to get up at the buttcrack of dawn to practice being on the losing end of a fight, mix up breakfast, clean up after the boys, then go out to find more food while Splinter watched the boys, get back empty handed or not before lunch because Splinter can only make tea, then he heads out into the sewers to scavenge while I baby sit, then eventually he gets back with whatever he found and we have dinner. Then comes another session of practicing being on the losing end of a fight, then one last clean up, then bedtime story, then bed.

And if I have time in the day and the boys are napping or something, I go into the dojo and pretend to be on the losing end of a fight, just to shake things up.

There were a surprising number of ways to fall without hurting yourself. Splinter was determinned I learn them all. I guess my story gave the impression I was clumsy.

During a normal trip, like a Miscounted-The-Number-Of-Stairs thing, you should roll with it, doing a somersault to displace the shock. If you've been shoved or pushed you should use the force to catapult you into a cartwheel thing to end up back on your feet. That one's actually pretty fun, even though I had to beef up my arms a bit before I could pull it off.

Thrown over his shoulder was the most difficult, despite his size he was stronger than me and took full advantage of it. When it got to the point where I was upside down, still in the throw, I was supposed to throw my legs as hard as possible so I wound up either on my feet to attack, or to leap away. There were other methods too, but I'd be here all day if I went into everything. I have quadruplets to watch.

Finding food gradually became easier as we found small amounts of cash in the sewers and scavenged anything not nailed down. I'm sad to say that pizza became a staple in our diet. The boys weren't complaining, but I often worried that they weren't getting what they needed.

Perishable foods didn't last long here. They were always the first things served come dinner time. Bread was a prime example, growing moldy in the damp air in the span of a week. I quickly grew sick of pb&j. Milk couldn't last long either, if we were lucky to get it. I did my best to get some because I knew growing boys needed it, but we were lucky to get a gallon a month, and it was always a few days past the expiration date.

In contrast canned goods could keep and keep. Whatever the grocer's threw away found it's way to our humble abode. Even cold, spaghetti tastes alright. Although I was bound and determinned to find a functioning microwave. And maybe a toaster, just because I'm tired of peanut butter.

If we could find a fridge it would place the amount of food we could have way up there. The problem was finding one that worked. The dump had plenty of fridges, it's just that they were so old and fallen apart and rusty that I didn't think they'd work. So in the meantime, I tried to fill up space.

Old, moth eaten rugs. One under the coffee table, and a bigger square one in the living room. The living room carpet was blue with green vine things. At least it used to be blue and have green vine things, now it was all washed out and covered in foot prints. It added _some_ color at least. The coffee table rug had been red, but now it looked more brownish. There were a couple black spots that looked like they were from stubbed out cigarettes.

And then I made the sign. Sewer Sweet Sewer. I put it in a frame with unbroken glass and hung it up dead center on the left wall, between the boy's room and the kitchen.

"Was dat?" Donnie asked. I had gushed about their first words. Donnie's first word was Splinter, I was so jealous. Mikey's first word was Cowabunga, which left me wondering where he heard it. Leo said Brother, totally called that one. But Raph's first word, shamed as I am to say it, was my favorite. I know I'm not supposed to have favorites, but I figure since it's just a word I can get away with it.

He called me mom.

I promptly swept him into my arms and hugged him. I actually embarrassed myself about that, and because the others saw it they wanted their own hugs so they kept saying mom until I had hugged them all ten times. Still, it was Raph's _first_ word, nothing could take that away.

I got a mirror with just one crack in the corner, it was just a head mirror and worked like a picture frame, so I put it on the kitchen counter until I could find somewhere else to put it. Splinter brought home an ice box, which brought cold drinks to us. It was still a bright blue and I put it in pride of place on the counter.

Around this time I realized it was December, Christmas was just around the corner. During training that night I asked Splinter what we should try to do. After all it was our first Christmas together, I wanted it to be special.

I found a little red wagon, and I took an entire week slowly filling it with presents. A basketball for Raph, a stuffed bear for Mikey, a remote control car that still worked for Don, and a little blow gun that shot corks for Leo. I also managed to get a little Christmas tree.

It was a tiny thing, barely taller than Splinter. I didn't have any decorations, no lights, and no angel or star to put on top. But I wrapped the presents with colored ribbons, writing names with sharpie. I went to sleep December 24th like I was five year's old again, straining to hear Santa's bells.

No training sessions during the holidays. So I wasn't sore and in pain when the boys came in. Splinter had added his own gifts to the meagre pile. A picture book for Don, a partly done coloring book and crayons for Mike. Leo got a jigsaw puzzle with every single piece, a real luxury. Raph had a baseball bat.

The way their eyes lit up and their mouths split into grins made the sleepless night worth while. Off they went, exploring their first toys and swapping them, sharing them, starting games they'd never played before. And watching them I could finally let myself believe it.

Splinter and I drank some tea, which by the way has more caffiene than coffee, and we shared secretive smiles. We just watched our boys play and sat in our special chairs. I rocked back and forth and today the creek seemed like background noise. Raph bounced his ball off the walls, Don's car swerved between his legs. Mikey's coloring book was getting filled and Leo tried to hit an empty can we had sitting on the table. I let myself believe it.

Christmas dinner in comparison wasn't anything special. I wished I could serve turkey and ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn on the cob, I wanted everything. Instead we had a large meat lover's pizza and orange juice, which was a luxury in and of itself. Everything all together, it wasn't anything really special. Still, I let myself believe it.

A house was becoming a home.

We wouldn't be done for a long while yet. We had yet to bring the rack in, we could really use a tv, and I want to have a real kitchen, not that little nook with a sink and boxes of cans. I want my boys to not want for anything, I want to get them these things brand new, plastic still on. Not weather beaten and hard and grayed out, not with paint flaking off or missing pieces. I want to walk down a grocery aisle and just start shoving things into a basket.

Since I can't do that, since I don't have the money or the means, then I'll continue like this. There is one thing I'll be glad for forever. Splinter found a disposable camera, and it still had film. I'm going now to have them printed out, and I plan to put them in my photo album.

It gets hard sometimes. I still have a fair amount of bruises from training, but I'm improving. I sometimes come across jerks topside, but I can handle them. Playing referee for four boys, turtles at that, is stressful but I can cope. And on days when I've had just about all I can take, I take a nice long walk to Nowhere at all. I explore the sewers, mapping them out in my head, I take winding paths through the dump, imagining these things as they must have been when they were new.

Occasionally we find something worthy of being brought back home. Splinter found a new robe for himself, which wasn't really new but was better than the rags he was was wearing. I got a cute blue and white sundress I started wearing on Sundays. We started collecting newspapers and the boys loved the comics. I had finally found a place where I was needed, wanted. I had a home, I was _making_ a home.

And it was a little more complete every time we sat together as a family at dinner. I could get used to this. Mikey screams in the background and runs from an enraged Raphael.

Oh yeah, I could get used to this.


	3. misplaced adventures and closure

Chapter 3: A Misplaced Adventure and Closure.

Splinter had been awfully quiet these past couple days. Christmas was gone and easter passed by without doing a thing. We couldn't exactly buy eggs and candy. We were entering the warm, sunny season. The season of pools and beaches and swim suits. Not that I could exactly go to the beach anymore, what with the ears and tail.

Ahem, well Splinter had been quiet. I was getting worried, so I pulled him aside before he could go out one early morning. The date was probably late in April but I hadn't been paying too much attention. I drew him aside while the boys went to the living room to play some new game. They were playing pretend like any other kid.

"Hey Splinter, penny for your thoughts?" I asked, handing him another cup of green tea. Tea is a good way of getting on his good side. He can never say no to a cup, even if those cups don't have handles anymore and have chips along the rim. The pot wasn't anything special either, banged up and a boring gray I was thinking of decorating with sharpie.

"Forgive me Leola, I have been putting much thought into visiting an old friend of my master Yoshi's." Yoshi was apparently his owner, back before he wound up a sewer rat. Yoshi had come from japan, he was a ninja, he'd been murdered. That was about all I knew on the subject. Splinter didn't talk about it often.

"I wish to take my master's ashes to be buried in his home country." I don't know where he got the urn, but it was ornate, it had gold painted handles and blue curliques all up and down it. It looked like something that belonged in a museum.

"How would we get to Japan?" Is teleportation one of those advanced techniques you tell me about? When do I get to learn?

"A ship, there are plenty that go in the right direction." We talked about it some more. Somehow I'd already agreed to the trip. I think at the time I was picturing a vacation at a beach resort, tanning in the sun and teaching the boys how to swim.

"How is he going to react to us?" I asked. Splinter had fit in a tiny hand carrier last time this Ancient One saw him. Now he was just over four foot tall, talking, and teaching ninjutsu to runaway single mothers. Oh, and he had four turtle sons. Can't forget that part.

"We shall have to see." I didn't bother trying to talk him out of it. Yoshi was a touchy subject and I knew Splinter cared deeply about his master, still mourned his death. I guess I hoped that in burying the ashes he could bury some of that sadness too. Splinter wasn't much for smiles and cookies, he was a stern teacher and could be hard man, but he was a good man too.

You just got this sense sometimes that there was something yanking on his tail. Everytime you tried to see what it was it hid itself, until you just about forgot it. And just when you think you can see the happily ever after, YANK!

When we told the boys I turned it into a mixture of an adventure and super spy mission. We couldn't be seen if we were going to stowaway on a cargo ship. We packed enough food for the trip, and fresh water, some coloring books and plenty of crayons. I had it all in my bag and carried two of the boys, wishing they were just a bit smaller. They were getting heavy.

My ninjutsu lessons had begun to pay off, because it was a real chore to get on board without being seen. I shushed the boys and got on deck, then followed Splinter to the hold. There we lay in wait, watching in case someone came down to check on things. We were counting on being left alone for most of the time though, since the boys could only stay still and quiet for so long.

I knew most of the basics and was getting more into actual attacks. Splinter had mentioned getting me a weapon but I had no idea where he was going to get a weapon from. I suppose Santa could bring one, but he'd never brought me anything I asked for so I wasn't holding my breath. Maybe I was too naughty.

So I could now block most armed attacks, so long as it wasn't a blade since that would result in me losing five of my nice friends. Having a third arm doesn't matter in the face of that, since it's limited to what it can pick up. For that it was better to not be wherever the blade was falling.

Where he got the wooden sword, I'll never know. He seems to enjoy his little secrets. Maybe I'll master stealth so much I'll be able to follow him and find out. I doubt it though, since he's light years ahead of me in ninjutsu.

I never knew I was sea sick. I tried not to groan too loudly and cradled my tummy and felt the ship bob up and down on the waves. My stomach wasn't going with the flow though, it stubbornly refused to stay in concert with the rest of my body. The worst part was I couldn't even relieve the feeling by throwing up, because I'm too tough. I just don't throw up. Never have before as far as I can remember.

So I'm sitting there and feeling sorry for myself while Splinter stares at his urn and the boys play. I decide to get some sleep, so I climb behind some crates to where a lot of straw is and settle down, using a picnic blanket to keep the straw from sticking me. So I lay down and close my eyes, hoping to sleep through the whole ride.

Seven days of tummy acrobatics. Seriously, I must have had the whole set up in my gut. My stomach was the star performer!

We got walked in on a few times, but the boys knew to hide when they heard a human coming and these guys weren't exactly being stealthy. All signs of our passage was hidden when we heard the echoe of footsteps approaching. The straw got hot and scratchy after a while, but we stayed until we were sure that we were alone.

Japan looked fairly similar to New York. Except that there were more suits, and words I couldn't understand. We had to wait until night to get off the ship, which was fair enough but I nearly collapsed in relief when I touched down on solid ground. I didn't get a chance to kneel and kiss the rock though, we were already on the move.

I think we passed through some invisible barrier. One minute there's this giant city, the next we're in a blizzard? I suddenly understood why Splinter had packed jackets into his bag. We bundled up the kiddies, allowing them to play in the snow for a bit before moving on. We made snowmen in the summer!

Then just as suddenly we must have crossed another border, because the snow was gone and it was summer again. The jackets went back into the bag and we started down this long dusty road that really did seem to go to Nowhere at all. I don't know why but I felt like I wasn't moving at all, like if I turned around the mountains weren't going to be any smaller. We weren't moving, the world was. Something like that.

We camped out in the open and after the kids fell asleep we were haunted by ghosts. The ghosts of a lost battle apparently, because they had swords and old wounds and stuff. Splinter reassured me that they wouldn't attack us if we left them alone. I think I just stared at him like I was crazy.

I kept moving with the ghosts, keeping myself between them and my boys. I didn't bother them though, and twenty minutes later they were out of sight. I don't think that counted for much though, considering they were ghosts. Needless to say I had a very hard time sleeping that night.

It took the whole day to finally get to where we were going. On the way I asked Splinter if this Ancient One had an actual name or not. I think he was confused though because he kept saying Ancient One was his name. I wonder if this mysterious master will mind me giving him a nickname? Would he chop me in half if I chose one he didn't like?

His house was huge, and he was tiny and fat. He was even shorter than Splinter, just two inches taller than the boys, I swear. Also he needed more clothes. I wondered if he'd be offended if I offered him my hoodie. But I'm not sure it would fit.

"Shoo Nezumi, and take the little kame with you." He scowled, making that little shooing motion with his hand.

"I am no demon, you knew me as the pet rat of Tang Shen. I am Splinter." How would he react? And what did he call my sons? What the heck is a kame?

"Poor, foolish Yoshi." For the guy's father, he was pretty quick to insult him. Then again, I didn't know the circumstances around his death, so I stayed quiet. Besides, sometimes that's just how people show they care. Insults. You know, the whole the Opposite of Love isn't hate, it's Apathy, thing.

"Well Splinter-san? Will you introduce me to the little kumkwats and the girl?" Kumkwats. Why did he call them kumkwats? Because they're green?

"Of course, Ancient One. This is Leola, who is raising my sons with me as their mother. The boys are Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, and Michelangelo." The boys were being quiet, for once. They just stared at the first human they'd ever been within five meters of.

At least, I _assume_ mister Archaic is human. It was implied.

"Leola, the lionness." He hums, stroking his goatee thing. Usually you only see Goatees on bad guys. Interesting.

"Well then Kitty girl, take kids inside and make dinner while I speak to Splinter-san." He ordered, gesturing at his house. Hmm, maybe he has decent food. This will be the first home cooked meal the boys have ever tasted!

Splinter and the fatman could be seen through the kitchen window. The boys started coloring half heartedly in their books. I think they were sick of coloring.

"What are you making?" Mikey asked, pushing a chair over to the sink where I was peeling potatoes.

"I'm making meatloaf, mashed potatoes with gravy, and macaroni." A gourmet meal. He had everything I could ever want. Maybe we could just stay here? Or at least take some of his appliances when we leave?

"I'll help!" I chuckled and asked him to pass me another potato.

I set everything to cooking, admiring the nice stove and fridge and microwave. The shells were boiling and potatoes too. I threw away the peelings and checked outside again. Yep, both of them were still under that cherry blossom tree.

And now that I looked a second time, it looked like there was already a grave there.

Dinner was a happy affair. Ancient One complimented me and Splinter said I had outdone myself. The kids asked for seconds and thirds. There would be no left overs. I ate until I thought I would burst, then swallowed a glassfull of milk to top it off.

Now in the past couple months Splinter and I had tried to wean the kids to sleeping alone. It worked alright for Leo, Raph, and Don. Mikey had this habit of coming to one of us in the middle of the night, but he was usually okay if we could get him to sleep. We had two less-than new mattresses at home, twin sized each, for Splinter and myself.

Ancient One gave me and Splinter the grand tour. The two pretty much ignored me, instead talking about memories. I learned that Yoshi had a brother named Yukio, and a girl had lived here too, named Tang Shen. Yukio and Yoshi had competed for her but Yoshi won her heart. In a jealous rage, Yukio killed Tang Shen. Yoshi in turn killed Yukio, then moved to New York with pet rat Splinter.

It was a very sad tale, and I wanted to be angry at myself for being glad it happened that way. The smallest things could've changed everything, and then where would I be? There would be no Leo, Raph, Don, or Mikey. No giant Splinter to teach me ninjutsu and give me a purpose. No tail or rat ears. I'd be a normal teenage runaway homeless girl.

We were having some tea when the boys ran in crying. Well, Splinter was having tea. I was sitting there and wishing I could sleep politely and trying to look interested.

"Mom! Splinter!" Mikey and Raph ran to me, Don and Leo ran to Splinter. I found that division interesting.

"There's a monster!" That was a typical Mikey thing to say. In his little mind everything was so much larger than life. There were heroes and princesses to be saving, and dragons and demons to be slaying. And there was an adoring crowd for the one who managed to do it all. I could see him believing in monsters in his closet or under his bed.

Except it wasn't Mikey who said it, but Leo. The tiny, serious little man who only believed in Santa Claus because I had told such an impressive story. Right now he was scared though and hugging master Splinter like I would hug the last parachute in a burning air plane.

"Forgive me Ancient One, we are still working on sleeping alone." Splinter was probably embarassed, but I thought there was something very strange about it. All four of them were terrified, even my little tough guy Raphie. He hugged me just as tight as Don.

"Come on boys, don't be afraid. Me and master Splinter will chase away the monster, okay?" They finally agreed to return to the bedroom. Splinter sniffed a few times, and I found myself wishing I had a rat nose instead of ears. Still, I imagined my ears were little satalites, straining to hear anything that didn't belong.

Nothing, nada. That did not make me feel better. If anything, it worried me more. Donnie was always so logical, I had the hardest time convincing him Santa was the one who brought the toys. He isn't one to see monsters in shadows.

We settled them down but I stayed in the room, letting Splinter and the Ancient One to go off somewhere. I didn't know why, but there was this feeling. Every instinct I had said to stay near the babies, protect them from this invisible threat. They had all at one time or another complained of a monster in their room, but I had never felt like this before.

The hairs on the back of my neck were sticking up. I couldn't stop the chills racing up and down my spine when I tried to brush them down. I sat up in my flat bed thing, my eyes going over my kids _one,two,three,four,_ like I was afraid one of them would go missing if I kept my eyes off them too long.

What was with these flat bed things? They aren't exactly comfortable. It made me long for my creaky mattress back home. One day here and I was already sick of this little _vacation._ I wanted to bundle up the kids and grab Splinter and get on the next ship heading to NY. I was willing to brave my sea sickness to go home.

Home, I wanted to go home so badly. I actually missed the smell of the sewers. I missed the rushing water outside my front door, the used furniture, the banged up tea pot. I missed my crack mirror and creaky bed, my sheet curtains, both blue and white striped and moth eaten.

My neck prickled when Splinter came in, but I knew he hadn't been what caused it.

"Leola, you are still up?" He mentioned briefly, moving to his own mat.

"Couldn't sleep." I mutter, feeling better with him as back up. Back up against what though? Why was I so jumpy?

Splinter fell asleep easily, accepting my insomnia as a matter of course. Which to be fair, it sort of is. I stay up late and the time difference didn't help, I was tired, I just refused to sleep. Normally I'm eager to flop into bed, but this isn't a bed, and this isn't _normally._ There was just something here that I didn't like and I was bound and determinned not to let the threat get my babies.

At least we were leaving in the morning. Apparently japanese people don't belong in long family reunions. What a relief.

Morning came and we were given some supplies for the journey back. At the dirt road we were saying good bye to mister Archaic, who was going on some errand.

"Bye Ancient one!" The daylight had washed away any lingering nightmares from last night.

"See ya!" I have to admit, the guy was interesting enough, but I could use a nice relaxing ride home right about now.

"Don't forget to write!" Mikey smiled, waving already. I chuckled.

"What're you talking 'bout? You can't read!" Raph demanded.

"Come little ones, let us return to our home." Splinter said, putting us all on the right path. I was glad to be leaving Japan behind, all we had to do was brave that weird barrier thing and get back to civilization.

Although, I would be sad to take the boys back down to the sewers. Here they could run and play in the sunlight, without fear that they would be seen. It was the kind of life I wish they _could_ lead. I had to take what I could get though, and this place wasn't as safe as it seemed, I was certain of that.

"It's the ghost!" Donnie gasped, pointing at the Ancient One. I admit, he's a bit scary when he's releasing enough fumes around candles to kill us all, but he wasn't a ghost.

"I see nothing." Splinter shrugged, but I noticed his brows were knitting together. My ears detected several short growls, below what a human could hear. I was making the same noise, shifting so Mikey and Donnie were shielded behind me as Splinter did the same. We couldn't see the threat, but at least now I wasn't the only one who knew it was there.

"But it's right there! Mom, can you see it?" Leo asked me, looking up and still holding Splinter's robe.

"Just because I can't see it, doesn't mean it's not there." I said bitterly, squinting to try and catch anything. A glimmer, the glint of reflecting light, anything that could tip off that I wasn't just going crazy.

"I believe your instinct to be correct Leola, there is a foul presence in the air." As glad as I was that Splinter was finally getting with the program, I had to resist the urge to mention that the foul presence was more than likely Ancient One. There goes a man who could fart his ABCs, and then the national anthem, just for fun.

"So, we're going to follow him, aren't we?" I groaned, recognizing what was happening. A ghost was stalking mister Archaic, of course Splinter would want to help. The kids would follow his lead, and they were the only ones who could see it.

All I wanted was a nice vacation, and maybe get Splinter some closure. I did not asked for this misplaced adventure.


	4. Brain Bleach and Nurturing

A/N: Okay, just for the record, why did the turtle tots stumble and sway all over the place after being mind wiped? It's like they were suddenly given enough alcohol to cause a black out or something. Also, the Ancient One had the masks in his vest, but he was saying good bye to Splinter that morning. Why was he carrying them around? Why didn't he give them to the tots _before_ going to the tribunal?

Disclaimer: I realized that I hadn't put this in at all, so here it is. I don't own TMNT!

Chapter 4: Brain Bleaching and Nurturing.

"We must be sure no harm befalls the Ancient One." Great, just checking. Sure, let's put the kids into mortal danger by following an evil ghost thing. Wasn't mister Archaic a ninjutsu master? Why couldn't he protect himself?

"Right, because a ninjutsu master can't protect himself at all." I sigh, half heartedly dropping the pack and putting it by the fence. If we were following mister Archaic I wasn't going to be weighed down by bulky clothes and food.

Three hours of following him, and he never even noticed. Maybe I was overestimating him when I said he was a master. Why couldn't he notice the six mutants following him? We weren't exactly the epitome of stealthy.

Maybe he knew we were there and was just playing along. Maybe he was lost in his thoughts, heaven knows I'd probably be in a daze if I learned my son had died. Whatever the reason, we kept following the stalker ghost. The kids were scared, they kept sending out these little noises that made me take their hands for a little while, until they felt better. They were scared, there was a threat. All I wanted was to scoop them all into my arms and walk in a controlled but tense pace in the other direction.

Since I couldn't do that for multiple reason, I forced down my instincts and tried not to panic. I didn't want Splinter to know how worried I was.

A floating island. Oh joy, I love it when the laws of physics don't apply. It just makes my day.

A giant oriental city floated in a giant chasm thing. There was a wide bridge that led to a giant fancy door with a strange red symbol painted on. Ancient One did something, bowed to it I think, and the doors swung open. Maybe they were expecting him.

The doors didn't close behind him, which I think is very shoddy security. It lets unsavory characters, say two rat people and four turtle tots, sneak in undetected.

It was quiet, not the normal peaceful quiet but the kind of smothered quiet that makes me uneasy. The entire city was empty, with this horrid echoe of the tiniest sounds that made me want to scream, just to fill up all the empty air.

Ancient One walked to this giant building in the center, which I assumed was town hall or something. The tots all converged on the door, trying to listen through it. Splinter and I had sonar ears though, so we could hang back a bit.

Nothing, not even a whisper. That was not normal. There should've been something, even the tiny scuffs of Ancient One's sandals. It was like the building just swallowed up every sound and refused to let anything out. It wasn't normal.

"I don't like this place." I shudder, feeling very much like I was in a horror flick.

"The ninja tribunal's Lap of the Gods has never been a friendly place." That sentence implied previous experience. He'd been here before? As a regular rat? I couldn't imagine there was much to eat here. On top of that, Lap Of The Gods? Very presumptious of these tribunal guys.

The doors opened without any warning, and startingly little sound. Just one second huge and unyeilding, the next, _whoosh!_ Behold the giant throne room! You are not worthy!

"Splinter-san? Kitty girl?" How come he's _san_ and I'm _Kitty Girl?_ It just wasn't fair.

"What are you doing here?" He demanded. I admit though I didn't pay too much attention. I was busy helping the kids up and staring at the four people in the room. The woman met my gaze and I felt something tugging at me, but not. Like something was pulling at my soul.

I didn't like that, I hate it when someone tries to dictact what I can do. I scowled at the green eyed woman and _pulled_ back. _My_ soul! Get your own!

Her eyes narrowed and I had a very bad feeling that I had just impressed her. Great, and she looks dangerous. Here's hoping she doesn't decide to turn me into a grease spot on the ground...Or push me off the edge of the city into that bottomless chasm.

"Guys! There it goes!" Leo cried, pointing at thin air. I bristled at the reminder of the ghostly stalker and glared in that general direction.

"He's going into that house!" Raph cried impatiently. That house looking like any other, but I figured something special had to be there for the ghost to sneak in.

"The Tears of Sorrow! Well call me a donkey's rear end! We must hurry!" The little fat man said, running towards the building. We followed, for lack of better ideas in my case. Also, did he just call himself a Jackass?

Inside there were stairs leading down into a circular chamber. Inside were three glowing artifacts. One was a spiked glove, another was a weird samurai-like helmet, and the other was a coffin. They were all glowing and floating on their pedastals. Again, I just love it when things defy the laws of physics.

"He's over by the pointy glove!" Don cried, pointing and tugging at my pant leg.

"I still don't see anything." I complained. How did we stop something we can't see? I couldn't even _hear_ it! Even with my super sonar ears!

"But it's right there!" Mikey protested in a panic, gesturing at thin air again.

Air blasted past me, which was the first inclination I had that trouble had officially entered the room, kicked off it's boots, and put it's smelly feet on the table.

The Ancient one and I were picked up, it felt like something with _teeth_ were swinging me around. I cried out in pain and tried to wrap my hands around the invisible jaws, my legs kicking out in search of a target. My tail lashed out and I scowled at the air.

Blood, my own, started seeping through my Aristocat shirt. I grimaced but covered my hands in it, painting the long bony neck. Now I had a little target to aim for.

"Leola! Ancient One!" Splinter cried, trying to fight the thing holding us. At the same time I wrenched myself around, pulling with all my might to get the jaws too loosen their grip.

"Mom!" The boys cried, taking up rocks. Some flew wide but over all I noticed they were hitting _something._ By now I was in a good amount of pain and I knew that if I let my grip slip then I would be chomped in half. My hands had cuts from the bones digging into them as well but I held steady, trying to control my breathing and focusing all my energy into my right leg like master Splinter had taught me.

"Kya!" I screamed, bringing my leg up in a wide arc at the bone neck I had covered in my own blood. I was rewarded with a sharp cracking sound (That I really hoped didn't mean I'd just broken my leg) and a sudden decrease in pressure around my midsection.

Splinter had managed to destroy the invisible neck holding up mister Archaic and I wrenched away a now visible and very dead head from my body. Ow, yeah that hurts. If I hadn't gotten my hands around the jaws I would have just died right there.

"Mom, hurry!" Raph had come down from the stairs, leaving his brothers to provide cover fire for our retreat. I can safely say that their first rescue mission was a success. I was soon nursing my wounds and helping my boys throw rocks.

Of course, I still couldn't see the main body of the skeleton man, but I could make accurate guesses judging from where my sons were aiming. In the end though, it was Donnie throwing a rock the size of his head that hit the amulet. I could hear the crack and suddenly a bright red light filled the room. And then I saw the bone demon.

Yeah I could see why the kids were so afraid of it earlier. It was seven different kinds of ugly.

"Curse you little kame, I'll devour your souls!" He growled, advancing faster than Splinter or Ancient One could keep up, them still being stunned by the thing's true form.

"Over my dead body!" I promised, meeting it and right away going for a over the head sweep kick at it's head. The thing hadn't been expecting me to fight back, I guess he underestimated a desperate mother, so I got him head on.

His eyes seemed to just roll, literally, into the back of his head as several cracks appeared along his skull. He was dead. I was still bleeding, but my boys were all hugging me and telling me just how awesome I was! Best vacation ever!

"That was awesome!" Mikey cried, jumping up and down, his enthusiasm was infectous.

"You just glared at him and then kicked and it was all over!" Leo positively beamed.

"You kicked _shell!_" Raph declared proudly.

"You were really cool!" Don said, still hugging me although he was much more careful about my wounds than his brothers. Oh, and speaking of wounds.

"OW!" I yelped, suddenly clutching my sides and sitting down hard. I lifted the shirt a bit and grimaced. I was going to have some new battle scars on my stomach and lower back. At least he missed my tail, because I'm pretty sure he would've amputated it.

"Leola, are you alright?" Splinter said, kneeling by side and pressing on my wounds, inspecting them.

"I'm fine, I don't think he got anything important." I answered. Why didn't the Ancient One get hurt too? That doesn't seem fair.

"Mom's hurt!" Mikey whined, looking nervous like he didn't know what to do. Which I guess, he really didn't. He hadn't seen me after getting the mats until I had put on copious amounts of band aids. And I was bleeding quite a bit. I should probably be doing something about that.

"You three have done well to take down the bone demon." I hadn't heard them coming. Which goes to show that I shouldn't rely so heavily on my sonar ears, even though they served their purpose faithfully until today. Stupid tribunal people with creepy glowy eyes.

"Yeah, thanks for helping." I rolled my eyes. Four apparent ninjutsu masters and they couldn't guard against one skeletal stalker?

"We knew the mystics would attempt to steal the artifacts, but we did not know when." The one that was super pale with face paint said, completely ignoring my comment. Fine, be that way.

"We owe you a deep thanks." He finished, nodding just ever so slightly at us. If he wanted to say thank you, he could do it with about fifty band aids. Did nobody care that I was potentially bleeding to death here?

"Shisho, I still do not understand, how was it the little kame could see the demon when we could not?" Mister Archaic asked, sounding very confused. He seemed more like the bumbling old man he was.

"The amulet he wore shielded him from the senses of wise and world weary, only those who are innocent, children, could detect him." Speaking of children, they were all poking and kicking at the body. Getting bone dust all over them. I sense a bath in their futures.

Wait, which am I? Wise or world weary? I like to think I'm very fond of life actually.

"Still, not all children would have seen the demon for what he was. These four are special." The other similarly built guy said, stepping forward.

"And what they have seen places us _all_ in danger." Something about his glowy eyes seemed to get stronger and for a brief moment I saw my sons' eyes light up too.

"What did you just do?" I demanded, darting over to where they were now stumbling and giggling like they'd had their first can of booze. As far as I could tell they weren't _hurt_ but a mom can never be too sure.

"I have erased all memories of this trip." He said stoicly. The woman stepped forward and waved her hand, and just like magic a portal appeared.

"My burrow!" Splinter gasped, and I recognized that faded rug and mismatched couch anywhere. Home.

On top of that, in the walking mountain's hands appeared the bag I had dumped at the Ancient One's place. I accepted it wordlessly, only nodding minutely in thanks. He tilted his head forward a bit, almost like he was nodding back.

"Before you go Splinter-san, Kitty Girl, I have presents for your little kame." Mister Archaic spoke up, rummaging in his vest. He pulled out four brightly colored bits of cloth and I stared confusedly at them while Splinter lit up in understanding, as was the usual way.

"Ninja masks!" Aw, I don't get one? Oh well, they looked absolutely adorable in them. Leo got a blue mask, Raph's was predictably red, Don's was a dark purple, and Mikey's was, again predictably, an exuberant orange.

"That is enough, through the portal now." Wow, the lady was snippish. Maybe holding open a portal was hard though, so I decided to cut her some slack. Plus I was still worried about the little soul exchange thing earlier.

"A moment Leola." She said just as I was ushering the boys, still tipsy, through. I looked at her directly, her with the green robe, white hair, and glowing green eyes.

"Leola?" Splinter asked questioningly. I knew that if I showed him how scared I was of this emotionless woman, he'd stay by my side. But that would only make her angry, I had a feeling she would respect independent strength.

"Go ahead, I'll catch up." I promise, smiling a bit to try and reassure him. He hesitated for a moment more and then stepped through the portal, which held, thankfully.

"You have a strength in you." The woman commented, seeming perfectly fine with holding up the works for this little convo.

"Nurture it." With that she passed a necklace into my hands, which immediatly glowed brightly before fading again, appearing around my neck.

"Go." She ordered. I didn't.

"I don't take orders from you." It felt important for me to say that. I gleaned that maybe she was impressed before I finally did step through the portal. It closed behind me and I was home again, back in our humble hovel with walls close enough that I felt safe again. A wall to put my back against.

"What did she want?" Splinter asked. I noticed the boys were taking a nap on the couch. That was fine, they deserved it after the week we've had. Stowing away on a ship, traversing Japan, the ghost stalker. I'm tired too.

"She said I had some sort of inner strength and told me to _'nurture it'_, whatever that means." I answered, showing him my new bling.

It wasn't very big or showy, which I was glad about because I think gold and diamonds might have tempted me too much. The chain was just this long ribbony thing that wouldn't cut against anything, as touch as diamond and silver. The necklace itself of the ouroborus, the snake eating itself. That was all, just a long silver suicidal snake.

It was about as big around as the palm of my hand. It's eyes were the only part that really stood out. Two rubies with a dark slit in each for the pupil. They glowed in the dark, which was really creepy.

I took it off, nothing seemed to happen. I held it in my hand and thought about throwing it away. I was still afraid of the tribunal woman though, so instead I bandaged my thankfully-no-longer-bleeding wounds and then turned the ouroborus into an anklet. The ribbon thing had a clasp so I could slide it off, just like a regular necklace. I turned that into a hair accessory for holding my hair in a side plait to keep it out of the way when I'm rough housing with the boys.

So I was still wearing her little present, just not as obviously as one might expect. I had to use our improvised shower to clean off the dried blood, but I felt much better afterwards even though the water was cold enough that I thought it was tiny ice crystals hitting me.

Oh, I never mentioned the shower. I don't like it because the only temperature on there seems to be just above freesing. It's mostly one of those T-shaped pipes that transports clean water to the city. I don't know where it goes, only that it's clean. It comes cascading down and we try to wash as quickly as possible, you know, before our lips turn purple and we lose our toes to frostbite. It's especially hard on the boys, them being cold blooded and all.

Still, getting off that sticky blood was a relief and I mourned the loss of my shirt. It would never be fit to wear again. Anyway, the shower is in the far right corner of the burrow, and we have this cutesy curtain with rubber duckies and fishies so I can take a shower in privacy. The water drained away in one of the mini-cutter things on the floor, and we could mop up whatever lingered.

We didn't have shampoos or conditioners, unfortunately, and I can't tell you how hard it is to stay in supply of feminine products. Luckily Splinter seems to understand the necessity of my having them. But anyway I felt better, although I knew I wouldn't be doing any heavy lifting for the next few weeks.

I slept like the dead, happy to be back in my own 'room'. I was invaded sometime in the middle of the night by four little turtles, but I only grumbled and made room. I don't know what Splinter said about my injuries, but for the next little while they were the perfect little helpers. Fetching things for me and cleaning up after themselves. It made almost getting bitten in half worth it.

I was right about the no heavy lifting ban. Splinter insisted I take it easy in training and everything. Of course, breaks don't last long when you're a single mother of four. Their helper status could only last so long. It was nice while it lasted, even if they sometimes just made more work for me.

Since I was laid up anyway, I began teaching them how to read and write. I sat them all down at the kitchen table and gave them a portion of the stockpile of paper I had gotten, along with old stained mini-white boards and some easy erase markers that still had ink.

That was when I discovered Donnie was a genius. I'm not talking, fast learner. No, that was Leo, and even Mikey on occasion. I'm talking genius, as in, Einstein and Richard Feynman! He learned the ABCs by heart after the first sing along, and then learned the various pronunciations and several small words by the end of the session. I was still trying to get the other three to remember the LMNOP line.


	5. Ninjutsu Training: The Way of Balance

Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT.

Chapter 5: Ninjutsu Training, The Way of Balance.

After I was healed, leaving several little scars around my tummy and back, Splinter began showing me more advanced things. I had upgraded from the Way of The Losing End Of The Fight, to the Way of Falling Flat On My Face.

Or as Master Splinter liked to call it, the Way of Balance.

We started out easy, a hurdle made from logs from the park that I had to walk and run across. It only took me a little while to figure out that either I had to move so fast that I had no time to lose my balance, or move so slowly a glacier could over take me on the high way. Then we got into the complicated stuff.

Ninjutsu doesn't have serialized katas. There's no real rhyme or rythm to it, which is why its both so effective and difficult to learn. Splinter had said I naturally held myself in a Proper Body Alignment, whatever that is, so we had moved straight to learning how to Walk.

Humans land on the heel, and push off with the ball below the toes. It's the Concentrated Method of Falling, in the words of master Splinter. It's just something we learned as toddlers and never bothered to upgrade as we grew, which is why it's pretty common to trip over nothing at all. Apparently ninjutsu masters are on a level above mere gravity though, because I've never once seen master Splinter stumble.

Splinter's way of walking involves a lot more focus on the toes. Which as a rat man is par for the course. His feet are weird. Simple as that, except he kept trying to make it so I could walk the same way.

He was a sadist too, when I had trouble not landing so hard on my heels he gave me special high heels to walk in. Not just one or two inchers with a big heel either, I'm talking stilletos, with a five inch thin as a drinking straw heel.

I sprained my ankle within the week. After which I refused to wear the shoes and just started walking on my tippy-toes as much as I could so he wouldn't force them back on me. I think he was surprised that I didn't have the necessary chromosome that makes walking in heels possible for all those runway models.

Funny thing is, I had an easier time in those red horrors topside because the side walks were dry. I sprained my ankle in the sewers when I slipped. I never slipped in my boots. They had good grip, and were water proof, and warm. The perfect shoes, even if they were hard to wrestle off at the end of the day and stank to high heaven.

Anyway after a while I walked like that even when I didn't have to. I put most of my under-average weight on my toes and landed almost daintily on my heels, and it made a difference. I'm not just talking the tripping over air thing, although there was that, but there was also a difference in _sound._

I spent one afternoon when the boys were watching the new tv (Read: Used but still functional tv) alternating between the regular style and the High Hells style. A definite difference.

Barefoot through the burrow on my heels, there were these soft thumps with every step. The sound of skin hitting pavement with all my ninety-nine pounds of weight behind it. With the High Hells style there was just this soft pitfall, something that I found out was only _just_ where a human could hear it, if I was walking up right behind them and they were listening hard.

In my boots, which master Splinter insisted I practice in ugh, it was harder. Boots weren't made for tip-toeing. I'm glad my feet stopped growing because having to get new boots that hadn't changed to fit the form of my foot would've made this impossible.

My boots were old and misused, they looked uncared for and unloved, which wasn't true at all. I mean, the not caring thing, sure. I didn't exactly have any shoe polish. But I love these old boots, they have served me well. They had at one time been a tan color, but my near year of motherhood and homelessness had given them frayed edges and there was gunk on the soles I knew would never be removed.

They didn't _like_ letting me land on my toes instead of my heel. I struggled with the things, my will against their's, until they did what I wanted them to do. I never fully mastered it, this method of walking (At least in boots) would never become second nature. Still, it was definite progress and helped me surprise the boys plenty of times when they were doing something they shouldn't be doing.

So I 'mastered' that little lesson in a month or so, and during it he made me run forwards, backwards, and frickin _sideways_ on that log. I grew to hate trees. And then Splinter decided I should broaden my hatred and brought in poles of bamboo and set them up, at least they weren't too high, just to my waist. That didn't help when falling though, and I fell. Alot.

"Keep trying Leola, you are doing amazingly well." Splinter was probably getting tired of watching me fall flat on my face, because he gestured me over to where some candles were sitting for 'meditation'.

Sitting with my legs crossed like he does is weird. Am I _supposed_ to lose feeling in my legs? Then I have my hands on my knees with the middle finger and ring finger touching the tip of my thumb, my back perfectly ramrod straight. My neck inclined a bit and eyes gently closed, like I was sleeping, or was trying to will away a headache.

That was the easy part though, because then I had to focus on my breathing. With every inhale had to take five seconds, hold two, release for five seconds. Each exhale had to carry with it the stress of the day, every inhale had to bring in peace and love and all that hippy stuff.

And of course, that means there's an unsaid ban against outside thoughts and distractions. Four bored turtles can be _very_ distracting. And since it was forbidden, guess what my mind kept wanting to wander to? You guessed it, _distractions._

Meditation wasn't my favorite part of the day, but for more than just an inability to focus. Ever since we got back from Japan, something about me is different. I'm not saying as in alien, or even unfamiliar, it's more like there was a small part of me that was suddenly given steroids and grew to about ten times it's original size.

Sometimes when I meditate my anklet begins to heat up. Not enough for smoke or to burn me horribly, just warm to the touch, like a cup of hot cocoa. The first time it happened I jumped a mile in the air and wrenched it off, afraid it was going to keep heating until it burned. I scared Splinter out of his whiskers.

When it happened I still jumped but noticed that after leaving the trance it cooled down. That was when I began meditating with my eyes half open. Warning, for those of you reading this who may want to try the same thing, only do it where you are unlikely to be observed. I'm told I have a very intimidating thousand yard stare.

Anyway, with my eyes and mind forcibly blank, I meditated in my little room in the dead of night during another convenient bout of insomnia. I kept my anklet where I could see it and meditated, and meditated, until I felt it heat.

This time I didn't stop meditating, and since I was so focused on my breathing and peace and stuff, it was hard to figure out what the anklet was doing. I had to look over the memory over what I had seen later so I could focus on the memory.

It glowed with a silvery light, but very faintly. Nothing like the bright flash from when it first appeared around my neck. It began to glow like a nightlight around my ankle, warmth moving from the ouroborus up my leg, then over my entire body.

Master Splinter told me that the warmth I had felt was chi. I was manipulating my chi, or the anklet manipulated it for me. I'm not sure which. Chi is life, as well as I can figure. It's in people, animals, plants, even the air and ground and water. Chi is everywhere, it is everything. Talk about being one with the cosmos.

Manipulating it was _very_ advanced, but not in the You'll-Die-Trying-To-Do-This way, but in the Herd-Cats way in that chi doesn't _want_ to be manipulated. It wants to flow like a river, going in the same direction it has always gone in with little deviation. Oh, there's a ginormous mountain in the way? Well I'll just erode it until there's a valley there instead.

Chi is like water, and water is surprisingly stubborn. Water can change to fit whatever it's placed into, the shape of a cup, a bowl, a curvy vase. It wants to fill up space, just like chi. But water also doesn't care about what humans want it to do.

Oh, there's a giant river with roaring rapids but I want to get across. Say you stupid river, stop flowing so fast!

Not going to work, obviously. Water doesn't care. Chi doesn't care. It's going to do what it has always done.

So manipulating it, a big deal. Something only masters can do without aid. I had aid, the anklet. Mostly it was manipulating the chi, I just sort of got it moving and the anklet kept up the momentum. But once it got moving, it was hard to stop.

So there I was, sitting on my bed feeling all warm and fuzzy and I don't know what to do with it all. I let go of the state and for a few minutes, the feeling lingers before it starts to fade. Like a pendalum winding down, it slows to a halt. Or, since it's _always_ moving and I was just moving it _faster,_ it goes back to the normal rythm.

Now, inbetween my little experiments (I was doing more meditation than I ever thought I would) I had regular training. I have to tell you, sometimes when my mind felt stretched to the breaking point it was pure relief to be allowed to hit something. Which was my main motivation for bringing down the patched punching bag.

I made sure the seams were strong, hung it up, and then practiced my punches and kicks until my body felt like jello. Or lead. Whichever came first.

We were entering August when I began making real progress on the poles. I could stand on one and go through different motions in slow motion, blindfolded. Ever since the bone stalker demon I have taken to trying to rely less on my eyes and ears. There are just some things I won't see coming, so I'm trying to compensate for it.

What's the saying? The more you sweat in training the less you bleed in battle? I don't want to ruin anymore shirts.

So I was on the poles one early morning, thinking about how much I wanted a clock. High kick, pivot, low sweep, falcon punch, move to another pole, hand spring, heel kick, pivot, wrist block, new pole, tail sweep, back flip, _OW!_

That, ladies and gentlemen, was the sound of me falling flat on my face. I think I broke my nose. It's bleeding, and there was this awful cracking sound of my head against the cement. Sure hope it's not broken, that would suck.

"You have improved greatly Leola." Splinter said, helping me up and offering me a damp rag for my shnozz. I grunted and held my head back to stem the flow. I don't think it's broken, wouldn't it hurt more? Then again I've never had a broken bone, so I have nothing to look back on.

"I fail at backflips." I managed to get around the rag. The bleeding was already starting to slow down. At least my shirt didn't suffer too badly this time. Only the collar has any red on it. The dull green of the mountain dew would stain to a nasty brown.

"You are throwing your torso correctly, your legs need only to match that same strength." I already knew that was the problem. Gravity was too much of a douche to lighten up enough for me to get my feet back under me before cracking me against the cement.

Ninja don't typically block. The wrist block I had been practicing is more for seperating two opponents. By raising my wrist in a way as to keep my hand limp I could turn away a blade from injuring the victim, putting the attacker off balance long enough to retreat.

Ninja prefer to be wherever the danger _isn't._ Misdirection, movement, dodging rather than blocking. Just like chi, don't stop moving. The still ninja is a dead ninja.

Despite Splinter being a master, our sparring matches are surprisingly even. I guess even though he learned the moves as a rat, and thus has more experience than me, he had to learn how to do them all as a mutant. So for a while we were on the same level of awesome, save his experience which usually led to him trumping me sooner rather than later.

My youth and energy might have something to do with the evenness of our matches. Most rats only live to be about three years old, and he hadn't exactly been very young. If I had to guess, I'd put his age in human years around fifties. Admittedly he was a very _spry_ fifty, but that was where I kept placing him.

In comparison my meagre sixteen years let me keep going at the same pace where he had to slow down and then speed back up. My bones were also much more solid, and though we were pretty much equal as far as weight went, I could use every little advantage I had once it came to grappling.

So we were both learning together, teaching eachother. Whenever he pulled ahead of me I worked even harder to keep up. Ninjutsu had become more than simple self defense, more even than a particularly enjoyed hobby, it was fun. It was like practicing for a football game everyday for weeks on end for that one shot at the super bowl. It was fun!

It didn't stay in the dojo either. There was more to my life than chi, meditating, and training. We still had to go out for food, we were always trying to find ways to improve our way of life. We found a fridge, a white one that was pretty big and worked once we used duct tape to fix the chewed up wires. Apparently the rats got to it.

So we could keep foods for a much longer time than before. Mold wasn't as big a problem as it used to be, living in the sewers and all. Now we actually had milk, and some juice. We could keep larger amounts of food so we didn't have to go out everyday, so now we could focus more on appliances.

I got the clock I wanted, it was this old timey thing with a pendalum that someone must've dug out of grandpa's attic. There was also a smaller old fashioned alarm clock, the kind that you have to actually hit to make it stop. It didn't last long though. When you have sonar ears loud, and most importantly, unexpected noises will make you lash out. I am studying ninjutsu. _You_ do the math!

Splinter found stove parts, and I went to a cafe to figure out how to put the damned thing together. Lucky it wasn't a gas stove or we couldn't use it. Sewers have an awful amount of methane and even our candles pushed it.

The pieces were scattered and everything, we had to search weeks to find all the pieces. In the end it was black and white, but worked except for the left back burner. I felt very proud of myself the first time I made eggs over easy for breakfast. From there on the options we had for dinner grew, especially after I scavenged some cookbooks. Amazing what people throw away.

Life was still going on, things didn't stop just because I got a new hobby. We foraged for food, scavenged furniture bits and pieces, and the boys grew.

After almost a year Splinter had agreed that the turtles were probably on the level of human five year olds, based on descriptions I gave him on what little of small children I knew. I wasn't exactly the neighborhood babysitter who always got asked to take care of the little ones. I was more the girl you called in when you needed an extra body shield.

I figure the baby turtles must've been about five to six months old when they were dropped into our lives. And based on the fact Splinter hasn't visibly aged since the mutation, he figures that at this point they're going to grow at the same right as human children at this age.

The details are blurry but I recall them only being a few inches long when I first carried them to Splinter's original burrow. They all fit into one coffee can with room to spare. I wish I knew what species they were originally, but I'm not an expert on reptiles and after the mutation they lost any of that designed skin that turtles in photos have, so I gave that up as a lost cause.

My second run in with the purple dragons was infinitely different than the first one. It seemed that their leader, guy by the name of Hun, a walking building, had made some changes since taking over. For one, they were a lot harder to run away from, more numerous, and tended to pack heat.

At this point in time it was mid-September, and I was doing some birthday shopping. So far I had found some comic books for Mikey, he's so easy to shop for, and a still working game guy for Don. Why did they throw away a game guy anyway? It wasn't like it was broken, these things are indestructible. I'll never understand people.

I was looking for something for Raph and Leo that night but wasn't having any luck. I left the dump after finding no suitable objects and began dumpster diving, particularly around residential areas and toy shops, where they were more likely to toss out what I wanted. Well I was half inside this one dumpster behind a ToysRus that was filled to the brim and I had just found a fire truck I thought Raph might like if I could find batteries.

"Hey girlie, what'cha doing in there?" I had heard them coming, heard the jingle of large chains and the scraping sound of crowbars being dragged against the concrete. I had hoped that they would pass me by, it wouldn't be the first time and typically they ignored homeless people since we don't have money. Not tonight though, which just figured since I'd been having a good haul so far, so of course the universe would want to remind me not to get cocky.

"Um, getting a toy for my son?" I tried, holding up the truck I had found. Please go away, please go away. There was _six_ of these guys, I was one ninjutsu novice! Universe, what did I ever do to you?

"You got to pay a toll to come through Purple Dragon turf. If you can't pay, we'll take it out of your flesh!" That slimy weasel threatened, rapping his crowbar into his other palm. This did not look good, but I forced myself to focus.

My hands dropped the truck and gripped the dumpster side as I vaulted at him, boot first. I got him pretty good and he was too stunned to try using his bar to block. I claimed his crowbar for my own and blocked the pipe of another guy, it was a good pipe too, looked clean. Maybe I could take it back with me later, to replace the leaky kitchen sink one.

My father made damn well sure I could fight. If there was anything I could thank that man for, it would be for teaching me how to fight. Go for the eyes, the neck, they'll expect a blow to the stomach, aim for the sides. Master Splinter had given me a whole new world to explore on causing bodily harm though.

He always told me that the way of bushido was a peaceful one, that we should strive to avoid conflict. The way I figured, at the end of the day you're still teaching people how to kill. Not that I killed them, unless that first guy hit his head harder than I thought, they would all make full recoveries. I just didn't believe in pacifiscm. For me, there had never been _peace._ Just the stubborness to heal and learn to avoid the next strike.

With a weapon in my hands, the others didn't last very long. I had them down and out within a couple minutes. I don't remember most of the fight, only that I was glad I hadn't tripped or anything like last time. There wasn't any blood, and they had never even _touched_ me. I had thought myself badass for outwitting four of these guys, back when they were wannabes.

I just took down six armed men with my boots and a crowbar. Without getting a single scratch. Get on my level!


	6. Birthdays, Babies, and Daggers

Disclaimer; I don't own TMNT. Isn't that obvious yet?

Chapter 6: Birthdays, Babies, and Daggers.

I didn't tell Splinter about my second encounter. I just hid the red firetruck with the other presents in a smaller maintanence room a few turns before the burrow, and walked home. It was late, or early actually, and he was still asleep along with the little turtles. I went to the dojo.

The thing was, I felt guilty. I attacked first, I didn't even _bother_ trying to talk things out. It was a preemptive strike against a possible threat. It wasn't the balance master Splinter had been trying to teach me. It was the sort of thing my father would've done. Heck, it was the sort of thing he would've praised me about.

I want to say I hate my dad. But then I'd be lying. I don't think you can ever hate your parents. It goes against some kind of primal instinct we have. We can dislike them, we can refuse to ever see them again, but I don't think we can hate them.

You can't pick your family, I had always thought that was true. I had chosen though, almost a year ago I chose to ask a rat if he needed help. I chose this life, and it could've ended so differently. What if I had run away when they had mutated? What if I had never offered help? What if? What if? There were so many what ifs.

I _had_ picked this family. I _chose_ this. I wanted a place where I was wanted, needed. A place to stay for more than one night, with people who wanted me there. I was so incredibely lucky. I must have used every penny of luck the universe had ever given me on just that one decision.

So, if I believe I can choose who is and isn't family, can I unchoose my dad?

No, I don't think so. Once they're there, they're there to stay. He was such a big influence in my life, although not a very good one, that it would be impossible to just erase him from my existence.

Humans don't have natural child rearing instincts. We are the only animals who don't. Every other creature on this planet instinctively knows how to raise their kids, they're instant experts. We learn how to raise others based on how we are raised. On how our siblings are raised. Our cousins. Our friends. Complete strangers. We learn by seeing what other people are doing.

So, I was raised by my abusive, alcoholic father. My mom died of breast cancer when I was small, and I don't even remember what she looked like unless I look at my album. My dad was heavy handed, believing that sparing the rod spoiled the child. If I whined, slap. If I got sick, no medicine, just tough it out. If I asked him for food, either make it myself if he was in a good mood or really drunk, or he'd kick me in the stomach so I'd be too in pain to eat.

When I was ten I finally figured out that what my dad was doing was called abuse, and I tried to get help for it. No one believed me. The only ones I had to go to were teachers who say hundreds of students everyday, they didn't have time for one abused girl.

So I lived with it, I toughened it out. I begged food when he wouldn't feed me and earned a bit of money doing errands for adults and homework for kids. I got by, and even though I knew I shouldn't have to live with that, I didn't try very hard to get away from it. Not until I was fifteen.

He didn't do anything unspeakably horrible that finally gave me the courage to runaway. He didn't nearly kill me, he never touched me inappropriately. He wasn't having a particularly bad week, in fact it was one of his better days when I left. He didn't tell me he regretted that I was born, funnily enough I don't think he did regret that. He didn't insult the mother I hardly got a chance to know.

The thing that inspired me to leave was meeting Karen. She was this girl at my highschool, she went to far with a senior and wound up paying for it the long way. I met her in the library, she was reading What To Expect When Your Expecting.

She wasn't date raped or anything, in fact the senior was helping her out and I think they really did love eachother. We got to talking and somehow wound up on the subject of home life. I told her about my alcoholic dad, she told me about the parents that had disowned her when they found out about the baby.

My dad wasn't a nice man, he was hard and cold most of the time. I still had good memories though, two from before mom died, three after. Having so few good memories made it easier to leave that life behind, but it still hurts when I wonder what I did that made it all change. People don't change suddenly with no good reason.

Karen had my ideal life in comparison. It seemed that up until her pregnancy it was all rainbows and sparkles. Summer vacations in Hawaii, dinner on the table everynight, even a devoted boyfriend and both parents.

Then they turn around and disown her just because she made a mistake and refused to abort? Back then, I thought it was cruel and completely threw my world view that other people had it easier. I knew some people had worse lives, but I just got into the mindset where it seemed everyone else's problems seemed so little in comparison to mine.

She lived with her boyfriend's parents, they were really understanding and were helping out a lot. She was even trying to finish school.

She cried when she talked about them. Told me she had tried ten times to get them to at least acknowledge her, but they had rebuffed every attempt. She wasn't even allowed to see her little sister. I guess I must've had some maternal instincts even then because I offered her my shoulder until her boyfriend found us thirty minutes later.

Lesson of the day? _Everyone_ has shit, that doesn't mean they can't wipe themselves clean. Karen found a new family and home, so I decided to take the initiative to do the same. I guess it worked.

I found a scooter for Leo and then Splinter and I pulled together every spare cent to buy a cake. It was one of those cakes that someone else ordered, but never picked up. It said Happy Birthday Joey on it, but I had enough change to buy some icing to change Joey to Boys. It was cheap, but the vanilla was as good as anyother and the icing was still creamy when we got it.

It was like Christmas all over again, and I caught it on film. Disposable cameras are easy to find, but it was a big risk getting the Christmas ones printed. I'm just lucky nothing came of it. But I had gotten a camera to capture the moment.

It was an old fashioned model that spat out the pictures with captions. It was black when first printed but after a few minutes the picture would appear. Mikey covered in icing from the food fight, Leo riding his new scooter, Donnie eating the cake with lights in his eyes, and Raphie plowing cake onto Michelangelo, which is how he got covered in icing.

Splinter was in the pictures too, usually in the background or presenting a present of his own. A jar of bouncy balls for Mikey, a book about turtles for Don, Raphie got his own The Quest For Camelot dvd, and Leo had a paint set with jars of different sized, procured from different sets. Why are his gifts always better than mine?

There was only one picture of me, and it was crooked.

"Ma, can I take your picture?" Raph asked, pulling on my pant leg.

"Okay, but you have to be careful not to drop it. The camera is fragile." I said, showing him what button to push for the picture. He grinned and made me stand next to the Sewer Sweet Sewer sign. I smiled and he waited impatiently for it to come out, careful not to touch the black fading ink.

I am a teenage girl, I'm allowed to be a bit vain in the look's department. It's hard when you live in the sewers, no cosmetics or lotions down here. But Raph managed to take a good picture regardless.

My hair has grown out, my silver ribbon keeps it in a side plait unless I'm training, which is when I fix it to a low pony tail. My side plait was in, my smile was in need of whitening gel but I had all my teeth and they were straight. My normal brown eyes looked filmy, like I was about to tear up. My mountain dew shirt was faded, I wore it nearly everyday after all. My skinny jeans had holes on the knees and were stained an ominious brown at the cuffs.

But it was a good picture, taken by my son. All my boys came to us and told me how pretty I looked. I hadn't been complimented like that in ever. It wasn't even my birthday, but I think that was the best present they could've given me.

October first was a great day, and we regaled the boys with the story of how we met. This brought up lots of questions about what had changed them that we could only answer sparingly. We didn't have many answers ourselves.

I brought out the album and we remembered our first Christmas. This was our first Birthday. I even showed them pictures of my mom, dad, and me. Splinter knew why I had left home, but there was no way I was going to ruin a good night by telling them about the ugliness in the world. The tribunal guys had something there when they talked about a special kind of innocence. I didn't want to be the one to spoil it.

"Mama, how come we've never seen your mama or dad?" Mikey asked, looking confused and pouting like the effort of trying to figure it out had given him a headache.

"My mama died a long time ago, when I was just a little girl." I explained. Death was such a hard thing to learn, and though I wanted them to stay little and innocent forever I knew it was best they understood that.

"Died?" Don repeated, looking sad now. And questioning.

"Dying is when your heart stops beating and your spirit leaves your body. If you're a good person you go to heaven when you die, so you can watch over the people you left behind." I tried to explain. I didn't know if I believed in God. But it was comforting, I think, to believe that there really was some higher force that made life difficult. It gave you something to curse when times were bad.

"What about your dad?" Mikey insisted.

"He's still alive, but he doesn't know where I am. I haven't seen him in over a year." That was all I said on the subject.

I thought that was it. The night was winding down, the sugar highs from the cake were starting to crash. It was almost time for the bedtime story. I was thinking of telling the story of Oliver and Company that night.

Splinter announced that we had one more birthday to celebrate though.

"What do you mean?" I asked. He smiled and went to his room, when he came back he carried some sort of weapon I didn't recognize. It was this straight dagger with a second, hooked blade attached to a long rope with a metal ring at the end.

"This is called a Kyoketsu-Shoge, I hope it will serve you well." He offered the weapon and sheath to me. I accepted them wordlessly. I didn't know what to say. I never would have believed I could own such a fine thing. The blade was perfect, and razor sharp. The rope was obviously new and the ring was a heavy weight. It was _brand_ new.

"Master, I-! How did you get this?" I was shocked, stunned, completely blind sided.

"I believe your sixteenth birthday passed us by without a celebration, so I hope you forgive me for the late gift." He smiled, completely unfazed by my disbelief. How did he get such a fine weapon?

He expected me to _train_ with this thing, didn't he? Oh yeah I can already see it! The Way of Losing My fingers, or maybe the Way of Losing An Eye!

"Thank you." I admit it, I'm a touchy feely sort of person. I hug things, I give things shoulders to lean on, I sweep my kids off their feet and do a little dance through the living room. I love to cuddle with my boys in the rocking chair in the evening when I tell them a story.

So I hugged him. A big bear hug where there was a distinct possibility of snapping his ribs like so many toothpicks. He returned the hug and after a moment of breathless thanks, I let go again.

"I'll train with it everyday! This is _awesome!_" I was excited, even though I knew how much work this was going to take.

Within a week, I sincerely regretted that promise. I had more lumps on the back of my head than I could count, my hands had rope burns, and I had nearly lost my toes. Only a frantic leap backwards saved my big toe.

"...I don't know why, but I sort of thought this would be safe." Silly me. This was right after the near loss of my toes, which resulted from me dropping the blade end when Splinter hit got through my flimsy guard to strike my hand with his cane. Canes hurt.

"Everything in life has it's dangers, Leola." I hate it when he gets all philosophical like that. I wanted to roll my eyes, but knew from previous experiences that he could _sense_ when I did that, even if he wasn't looking, and as previously stated, canes _hurt._

"You have practiced enough for now, do your cool down stretches and then perhaps we can have breakfast." That sounded nice, even though today it would just be cereal since we ran out of eggs and bacon. I need to find more money. Why can't people lose fifties in the gutters?

"Yes sensei." I groaned, getting up and feeling sore muscles push and pull and strain. I needed a shower but I knew that the cold water would only give me cramps. At least I had a decent supply of deoderant. I hated smelling nasty all day.

The stretches went by quickly enough, taking half an hour when I was in a hurry, and forty five minutes when I took it nice and slow in the evenings. It was about seven thirty when Splinter scrounged up the kids and I had the bowls ready and waiting.

Even when having something as blande as cereal, I liked to add things. Apple slices on the side, or cut up strawberries directly in the bowl if we had them. Today it was banana slices with corn flakes, an old time classic.

"Boys, be good for your father, I'll be back soon." I ordered them as I was leaving for the afternoon shift.

"Love you!" I called through the door as they gave their assurances of good behavior. I waited a handful of seconds to get four replies before I closed it behind me. Topside called, we needed money.

I was wearing a red cap to disguise my ears, since holding them down for very long made them ache. A black cloth jacket I had found hid my tail as I walked down the streets, a normal person.

Splinter and I had different ideas about stealth. He was all about the shadows and not being seen. I was of the opinion that it didn't matter if you were seen, so long as you weren't memorable. That worked better in practice for me than for him though, so I never pushed my views on him.

There was more than one way to go undetected. A soft footfall and creative use of shadows was only one part. To be seen, but not registered, is the way I prefer. It lets you see more, but I have an ulterior motive.

Sometimes I just wanted to be around people again. I wanted to hear things like celebreties and new movies, new clothes and fast food. I had had enough pizza to last me a life time. So on days when we had food but no money, and especially as I began my training, I found myself in the park.

People liked watching me give demonstrations. Back flips, front flips, high jumps, full body sweeps that at first glance look like break dancing. I'd get a few watchers, and if the crowd was generous they would leave a few dollar bills in the can. I was having a good day so far, ten bucks altogether last I counted.

When it came time to quit I put on the lid and listened to the jingle as I walked. It was getting late, the sky was being stained a bloody red. I was tired from the demonstration/extra training and I admit, I wasn't trying too hard to go unnoticed.

The alley I chose was a long one, with two back streets going left and right. I knew a manhole on the left would put me only a few short clicks from the burrow and I was eagre to get myself a snack.

The first inkling I had about my own stalker was the footsteps that matched the tempo of my own. Except of course that I was using the High Hells method so mine were nearly soundless. Under my cap my ears listened to the sound of footsteps, breathing, and a fast heart rate.

Experimentally I turned right instead of left. He turned with me. Nothing strange yet, nothing was down the left route except the manhole. I was coming up to a dead end though, a big fence that would be easy to hop over for me. For this guy it would take a few minutes, in which I could blend into the crowd on the other side.

"Wait." I'm an idiot. I deserve to be shot for my idiocy.

I stopped, whirling around and putting a hand inside my jacket to unclip the kyoketsu sheath. It was coiled under my left armpit, so if I tossed out the blade it would go straight at the target, letting me grab the ring.

Except that any throw I might make was much slower than a bullet. The click as he flicked off the safety chilled my blood and I trembled. It sounded like a thunderclap to me. Staring down the barrel of a gun, I felt afraid for my life for the first time.

Later, there would be others. Fear not just for my life, but for Splinter and my sons' lives. Someday I would learn how to keep a clear head in times of crisis to help my family through. I would stand as a pillar beside Splinter to support my sons, and I would look back on this day as both less than and worse than anything my father had done.

"Look, I'm desperate. I need food! Just give me your money!" He was loud and demanding, but even from here I could see the way he trembled. His hand was shaking. For an instant I had felt cold fear, now I felt concern.

Yeah, I was worried about the guy leveling a gun at my head. I'm weird like that.

"..." I bit my lip. "I have to feed my sons. If you want, I'll get you some food."

Felix waited for me in the park that night. When I left the burrow I left a note for Splinter in case he woke up and I wasn't there. I took two apples, a ham sandwhich, and a bottle of water with me.

"Thank you!" He sobbed as he dug in. He at least had the sense to eat slow at first. After a period of not being able to eat it was important to eat slowly to be sure that you wouldn't be sick. Almost like your stomach forgot what food was and purged it to be safe.

"Rough times?" I sighed, leaning against the park bench while he swallowed some of the water. He had the good sense to save one of the apples and half the bottle for later. He'd been on the streets for a while, so why had he gotten so starved? It was relatively easy enough to get food, even if it wasn't the freshest.

Felix had stubble on his chin and neck, it made him look older but he told me he was twenty. He wore layers, as any good homeless man did as the weather got colder. Patched pants and faded coats, one on top of the other. Gloves that had seen better days with oil stains on the fingers.

"Yeah, like an idiot I dropped out of college thinking I knew better. My parents weren't willing to take me back in, so I wound up on the street." He sighed. I shrugged, he'd made it farther than me. I had quit in sophmore year.

"I dropped out of high school after becoming a mother." I lied. It was sort of true, except dropping out had happened _before_ meeting Splinter and the boys.

"Now I live with their father and raise'em best I can by performing in the park." I had put the jingly can in my room so he wouldn't get any ideas. No target, no motivation. I still had my kyoketsu-shoge.

"Their?" He questioned.

"Quadruplets, multiples runs in the family." Which was true, I vaugely remember my mom having a twin sister in Arizona.

"Boys?" I nod in answer, and then because I never had the chance before, I brag about them. Leaving out the green skin, carapice, and shells of course.

"Cute boys." He smiled.

"It's good to see some guys taking responsibility of their kids after getting the girl pregnant." Did he? Oh, I guess if I take out the fact that Splinter is a giant rat it _sounds_ like we're together together. Not just together as partners, but _together_ together.

"Oh no! We're not _together!_" I felt my cheeks burn as I spazzed out and tried to explain. I tried to say something along the lines of us just _living _together and not romantically involved, but I gave up when Felix began laughing.


	7. A Rat On The Streets

A/N: I like writing this story. It's relaxing.

Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT!

Chapter 7: A Rat On The Streets.

When I left Felix, it was with the promise to meet again. I had asked him why he was so desperate for food and he revealed that he'd been very sick until recently and hadn't the strength to search high and low. He promised that he'd try to find his own food so he wouldn't have to mooch off me.

Talking to a human guy, even one four years older than me, was awesome. I practically skipped all the way back, although I made sure to bring in some new piping so it would look like I was out foraging. For a year now my life has been about the boys and training, training and the boys. It was nice to have something that belonged to only me.

It wasn't fair, Leo, Raph, Don, and Mike all deserved to be going to kindergarten. They deserved to run around on the surface, under the sunlight. I was always worried they wouldn't get enough vitamin D because of our lifestyle. They deserved to grow up, make friends, get girlfriends, start families. Splinter deserved to meet a nice woman and live out his retirement in the bahamas!

I _looked_ normal, for the most part. I could hide the tail and ears, my claws could pass as really long nails. I could pass for human if I was careful, but I didn't want to. I hated hiding who I was. I wanted to let my tail swish behind me while I walked down the street, I wanted my ears to catch the full range of New York sounds. I wanted to take my sons to the park on a Saturday morning.

Was it selfish to want to pretend, even for a little while, that I was normal? I already established it was unfair, and when I look at it being selfish, I recoil. I don't want it to be selfish. I'm a teenage girl, aren't I allowed to have fun once in a while? I can't be _just_ mom all the time.

I love my boys, I love Splinter in the solely platonic sense, I wouldn't trade them for the world. But humans are social creatures and I needed more than just my kids and my teacher sometimes. I needed a girl I could talk to, a guy to go to the movies with on Friday nights. I wanted to go to wild parties.

Back in the burrow I left the pipes on the kitchen table to deal with in the morning. I stepped into my room and laid out the kyoketsu beside my bed. The grandfather clock had said it was one in the morning, I would need some sleep before getting up at six for practice.

I lay there for a while, trying to trick myself into falling asleep. It wasn't like my bed was super uncomfortable, or even overly noisy. I was tired from the long walk and the long talk, I should've been tired enough to fall asleep when my head hit the pillow. That I wasn't, just reminded me how unfair everything was.

The next day was the same as any other before it. I trained, I made breakfast, Splinter went out, when he came back we had lunch, I went out, when I came back we had dinner, training, bedtime story, sleep. The same schedule I'd been following since this whole adventure thing began.

"Does something trouble you, Leola?" Splinter asked kindly as we had a cup of tea after evening training. I had been pretty quiet all day, tired mentally and physically from trying to debate the moral standings.

"Just tired, I didn't get much sleep last night." I shrugged, drinking the jasmine tea. I had never been one for tea before, but apparently it was an 'adult' drink in Splinter's world so I usually had a cup too. It wasn't bad, so long as you didn't scald your tongue.

"If there is anything you wish to speak about, I will be happy to listen." He told me, drinking from his own cup. I struggled to keep the secret. There's just something about parents that makes you think that whatever's bothering you, they already know. It didn't make sense since, even if he was a dad, he wasn't _my_ dad.

I didn't tell him. It was stupid, selfish, and risky as all Shell, but I didn't. I wanted something for myself, I wanted something I could recognize as normal, not an existence of hiding and training. I needed more than that.

"Hey, Leola!" Felix waved at the entrance of an alley. I had popped out a few streets away and I picked up the pace when I spotted him.

"Hey Felix, keep you waiting?" I asked.

"Got here early. Do you want to head to the park?" I nodded and jokingly linked our arms and began skipping, humming the tune to the Wizard of Oz.

I wouldn't say it was a date, but it was nice to hang out with someone other than my family. We walked through the park, circling the lake a couple of times for lack of anything better to do. We eventually claimed a bench for ourselves, continuing our conversation.

It continued like this for a month. In fact Thanksgiving was just around the corner. I had been feeling guilty on top of everything else for the fact that I was hiding a lot from Felix. He was a cool guy, though not without his faults.

He was lazy, and if he thought he could get away with it he would beg food off me. I didn't let him get away with it very often, as you can probably guess. Food was important in a family of six. He was also a liar, which turned me off faster than you can say Ussop. He lied about drinking, but you could smell it on him, and his eyes were a bloodshot red. That brought us to item number three, he drank. Often.

You might be asking me why I hung out with a guy like him after figuring out all these faults. Well, as far as I'm aware nobody's perfect. Everyone has their problems and it wasn't any matter of mine. If Felix was wasting his spare change on booze, that didn't affect me. So long as he never showed up drunk.

I told him in no uncertain terms that if he ever showed up drunk then I wouldn't stick around. Even smelling the beer on him hours after the fact made me sick to my stomach. Familiar bloodshot eyes and bad breath, it scared me. Honestly and horribly scared me so much that I wanted to run to the nearest manhole and never come out again.

It wasn't just secret meetings though. I still had family problems too. The tv had been a godsend because it occupied the boys so we could get work done. You know, repairs, training, organizing the food and planning out the next shopping trip to get the most bang for our buck. I was still doing my afternoon shows.

But the tv had also begun teaching my sons words they had no business in saying. Shell actually came about as a compromise with Raph after I washed his mouth out with dish soap for saying another four letter word beginning with S. On top of words, it taught them about the world they had never seen. Or at least, didn't _remember_ seeing.

"Hey Ma, can we go topside too?" Raph asked as I was leaving one day.

"Sorry bud, but you have to stay down here, okay? I'll be back soon." I said, smiling sadly and giving him a quick hug.

"Why not?" Mikey asked. I have to admit, he was spoiled rotten. There's just something about the way he hangs his mouth slightly open in a pouting look that makes me want to give him all the sweets in the world.

"The surface is a dangerous place Mikey, I don't want my boys getting hurt." I told him, trying to coax a smile out by tickling his chin.

Splinter and I had been a united force against them going topside, particularly since they hadn't begun training yet. We had plans to start them off with the New Year, but for now we rebuffed any possible adventures in the land of skyscrapers. I liked my boys _not_ strapped to disection tables, thank you.

I had nightmares about that. I'd imagine them all seperated from us, Mikey reaching out and being beaten back by a scientist. Leo trying to shield his brothers but being strapped down to a table. I imagined Don trying to fend off needles and scalpels. I imagined Raph crying out in pain and fear and _rage_ as he and his brothers were cut into. I imagined Splinter going on a rampage, I knew that if our sons were ever killed as Yoshi was then he would snap.

As for me, I had nightmares about what I was willing to do too. My kyoketsu-shoge encircling the enemies as I advanced slowly along the cord. My blade cutting through vulnerable parts as I avenged my children. I am Mama, hear me roar!

The boys knew that humans weren't to be trusted. That if they ever saw a human they must ensure the human never saw them. Splinter had even invented a chilling game where he would cluck his tongue in a way that reminded me of Felix's gun, when he was clicking off the safety. Even I had joined in on this game.

He would enter stand outside whatever room we were in, usually just beyond the doorway. And he would flap his tongue against his teeth to make the _ch-click_ sound that had us all dive for cover.

In the living room I would hide behind the clock and then reach silently unclasp the sheath to my weapon, ready for a threat that wasn't really there. I would follow with my eyes easily as my boys scrambled for hiding places. Don wound up behind master Splinter's chair, Raph and Mike under the couch, and Leo behind the tv stand.

Then Splinter would come in and we would leave our respective hide aways. I always winced when I heard that sound because it hurt to watch how slowly the boys hid. Splinter would speed up the time it took for him to enter the room over time, so the boys had to get faster. They thought it was a game at first, but the way Splinter and I treated it made them unchariacteristically serious.

The first time I walked into the kitchen, mimicing the sound of a gun, they hid without even registering that Splinter was still there. He hid as well, and my ears could pick up the surprised heartbeat on top of the fridge. Most people don't bother looking up. Humans tend to only see what is on their level. We can't do that though. We have to teach ourselves to look up, down, and turn around.

They had reacted without thinking, to a threat that hadn't even registered. Someday maybe this game would save their lives. When they were faster, older, and I wasn't able to protect them anymore. The game taught them something else too.

How to fool their mother.

So I left that day, giving the customary love yous and getting them in return. I had told Splinter that I had met someone, but he hadn't insisted on any course of action, leaving me to handle it myself. I appreciated the trust. Besides, I highly doubted anything would come of Felix and me, especially as I planned to give him a little test. It was time to see how he reacted to me without my cap.

I went slowly, thinking about this and that, planning trips to the dump and wondering if I had enough saved up to get some medicines for the winter season. The boys were susceptible to the flu and I especially had a hard time getting over coughs and colds. Besides, it would be good to start stocking up on things like that. I just needed a cabinet to lock them away in so the boys couldn't get their three-fingered hands on them.

It had rained the day before and early that same morning. I hadn't gone out yesterday, Splinter had told me. Even without that though you could tell it had rained hard. The water was higher than normal, filled with debris, and rushing past at an unprecidented speed. Once again, I thanked my reliable old boots.

The water made a lot of noise and covered the pursuit. I wasn't very good about keeping my guard up when I left the lair either, so with all that it's easy to see why I missed four turtle tots tailing me. The six year olds followed along at a steady pace, not giving away their presence by whispering to each other or anything.

I had gotten to the alley early despite my leisurely pace. I stepped out for a moment to check if I could see Felix coming, and to relieve some tension via moving around. I hate waiting for things. I figure that moment must have been when the boys clambered out of the manhole and hidden around the trash, it would've been their only opportunity.

"Leola, hey girl!" I could tell he was drunk the minute I heard him swagger through the mouth of the alley.

"You're drunk." I glared, tensing up before forcibly relaxing my muscles and crossing my arms. This brought my hands near the zipper of my jacket to reach for the kyoketsu. I'm paranoid around drunks.

"Nah, not really." He promised, lambering over.

"Forget it, I told you I won't deal with you when you're drunk. I'm going home." I asserted, moving past him since I didn't want him to know I arrived via manhole.

"Wait, wait, come on! Don't be a baby!" He said, grabbing at me. He was clumsy with all the drink in him, this close I could smell the musky scent I had come to despise. He got me by my hair, yanking me back with a yelp and making my cap fall.

I don't think he noticed the ears at first. He was drunk and focused on stopping me from leaving. He noticed when I wrapped the cord of my kyoketsu-shoge around his arms and pushed him back to give me space though.

"What the-?" He blinked, squinting at my head that alerted me to my fallen cap.

"Freak!" When I unzipped my jacket to get my weapon, my tail fell out. Inconvenient thing that it is. That word hurt though, so much more than I thought it would. I'd been called mean names before, but this one had a way of digging through your thick skin to get to the nugat center and erode away any self respect you had.

He tried to attack me, running forward and nearly tripping on the rope at his feet. I moved aside easily, evading the clumsy strike. It was slow, he was slow. I was on caffiene bullet time!

"Goodbye." I said, reclaiming my rope and pushing him out of the alley, letting him run off screaming into the night. No one was going to believe him when he told them he had been attacked by a rat woman. He was drunk. He would never see me again.

After that day, I stuck to the shadows a whole lot more.

"Ma, you okay?" Sadly, that was the first inkling I had that my sons had followed me. They left their hiding places and ran to me, hugging me and looking up and just _why_ did their nice mommy get treated so bad?

"You followed me?" Wasn't that a kick to my ego. Not even training yet but they had already tailed me succesfully, only being discovered when _they_ chose it.

"We wanted to go see the surface." Leo said guiltily, looking down with his hands behind his back and kicking the dirt. He looked so much like a dejected puppy that I patted his head.

"You should never do that. The surface is a dangerous place, filled with unsavory people." I said, trying to be stern. I was hurting though and didn't have the heart to scold them properly. I think Mikey must have sensed that, he's more in tune to other people's emotions than his brothers.

"Mama, why'd he call you a freak?" He asked, confused in a way I wish he wasn't. He wasn't confused about the meaning of the word, he had watched too many cartoons not to know what it meant. He wanted to know why _I_ was the freak.

"Regular humans don't have tails or rat ears, Mikey." I sighed. I liked my tail, it was cool, and the ears were useful, but sometimes I wanted to be normal again. See what it got me? A drunkard of a friend who might have put me and my children in danger. Well, he failed his test. Now let's see if I can get a better score.

"But you're the prettiest girl ever!" Don argued. It was like his whole world had suddenly gone from 3D to 4 and he didn't know what it looked like anymore. It was the best compliment I'd ever recieved though.

"Let's go home." I said, steering them to the manhole. Once we were all on the walk way I gave myself a stern talking to before turning on the boys.

"And when we _get_ home, you're all grounded from the tv for following me." A chorus of groans filled the air and sweetened my outlook.

Splinter had been half crazy with worry when the kids vanished. Me escorting them back home relieved that worry, and allowed him to transform it into righteous fury. There's something inherently terrifying about a father disciplining his children. We took away the tv, placing it in his room, sent the children to seperate corners of the living room, and told them that they would get their tv back in one week.

I underestimated how annoying four grounded boys could be. Without the tv they went back to playing their games and with their toys. It got loud fast.

"Hey Splinter, do you have time for a talk?" I asked before the evening practice.

"Always my dear." He assured me, gesturing for me to join him on the meditation mats.

"You remember I told you I met a guy named Felix topside? Well, I was meeting with him tonight when the kids followed me." And if I was trying to get out evening training, well, you wouldn't catch me saying it.

And for those of you wondering, no. It didn't work.


	8. The Loudest Silence Becomes A Sound

Disclaimer; I do not own TMNT.

Chapter 8: The Loudest Silence Becomes A Sound

It was quiet, too quiet. Not the good, nighttime sleepy quiet. Not the artificial hide and seek quiet either. This was the quietness of an empty house. The quiet of tip toes and soft door clicks. It was the quiet that had me look up from my Harry Potter book on the couch and automatically search for the boys.

It was five days since their first forway into the unknown world of New York. A Thursday morning with Splinter out doing his ninja thing to bring home the bacon. Leaving me as any other morning to clean up after breakfast and entertain the boys (Read: Don) with lessons. We had finished for the day though and it was only an hour before Splinter was due back.

I didn't see them anywhere. I didn't hear them either. There were no sounds of wheels from the scooter or skateboard. No pop of the cork gun or repeated thud from bouncy balls. No sirens from the firetruck. Nothing to suggest four six year old boys lived here at all, save for the toys I hadn't gotten around to tidying up.

"Boys?" I called, going through our home. First their room, then mine and Splinter's, the kitchen and dojo. Nothing, not even a whisper. That was when I got afraid.

Outside there were no trails to tell me where they had gone. The water level had gone down dramatically over the last couple days, and they'd be level until the snow began melting later in the year. That didn't help my overactive imagination banish the visions of tangled limbs and heavy shells sinking into the water.

I hesitated for a moment, knowing Splinter would be back and he was better at tracking than me. But an hour could be a long time when you were a kid. I left a note in the kitchen and tried to put myself in the mind set of kids. I went right, because was right was always right when I was a kid.

"Boys! Answer me!" I called as I ran. I had my kyoketsu-shoge sheath unclasped and the ring in my hand. It was a comforting weight as I ran down walkways, trying to find some clue as to their passing. What if I had gone the wrong way? I was wasting time!

There was a little pile of old boards and bits of cloth that I knew hadn't been there yesterday. Splinter could have made it, but my heart was bolstered by believing it meant I was on the right track. I took a deep breath and shouted.

"Leo! Raph! Donnie! Mikey!" I shouted, listening to the echo bounce off the walls. Nothing. No reply.

Topside. Would they have gone topside, even after all the punishment we gave them? I paused by one ladder near the pile, still drying. They'd been by lately. Where were they now?

"Boys!" I yell, and now there's definite worry creeping into my voice. What if they got lost? If they got hurt and couldn't get back? What if someone found them?

There was no teenage girl or badass ninja that ran down the tunnels. A quick peek out of each manhole passed, frequent shouts calling for my sons. I wasn't a teenage girl or any capable ninja, I was just a mom Hell bent on finding her babies. My limbs didn't grow tired, my mind blocked any horrifying images except to motivate me to move faster. I was a machine, my only mission in life was to search and rescue.

"Where are you?" I cried as loud as I could. My lungs were getting some good exercise. They burned in my chest, and only when I stopped by a manhole did I feel the burn in my thighs from all the starts and stops and the punishing pace. I made a mental note to do more long distance running.

I splashed through waters and tried to gauge how much time had passed. I hadn't gone by any other signs of their passing since the pile and doubts plauged every inch of my mind. Surely by now Splinter would be searching too. We'd find them and then go home and I'd tie them to the living room _couch._

I was panicking. I couldn't afford to panic right now. I needed a clear head or I was going to exhaust myself. I needed to find my kids.

"Leo! Raphie! Donnie! Mikey!" I shouted again, trying to listen for any reply. Surely they'd hear the echoes. People on the _surface_ probably heard my frantic search. I wasn't exactly being stealthy.

"mom?" It was tiny, a distant voice that had half my mind wondering if I'd imagined it out of desperation. The rest of my body was way ahead of me though, ears pinpointing the sound and me forcing my body into over drive as I gave another call. Please answer, please answer.

"Mom!" Louder now, and I nearly sobbed as I sucked in air and pushed away the need to shed tears of relief. Not until I saw them, I promised, not until I had counted them all, _blue, red, purple, orange,_ and held them in my arms. Then I could cry and berate them and extract promises to _never_ leave the burrow again.

They were at the sewer junction, where lots of tunnels met and drained down into a central canal that went straight to the ocean. One false step, one slippery foothold, and they'd never get out.

They hadn't entered the junction itself, thank God, but they were standing outside it with guilty expressions and bowed heads. I panted and put my hands on my knees, trying to force air to get into my lungs _faster._ When I had my breath back I was going to scream at them for so long that their _ancestors_ could hear it.

"Why did you leave? Do you have _any_ idea how _worried_ I was?" I demanded pointedly. I had found them, they were safe, no one was hurt. It was perfectly all right for me to yell at them now. They were going to be grounded until they turned twenty! I was going to take them one at a time, put them over my knee, and brandish a belt. With a _buckle!_

"W-Well, you said n-not to go topside so..." Donnie sniffed weakly.

"We thought we could play in the sewers." Leo finished, stepping forward. He looked like he half expected to be the only one punished. Like he was the _only_ one who deserved to be grounded from now until Judgement Day.

"...This was not the way to go about it." I sighed, trying to rein in the temper before I used some very age inappropriate words. I just had to explain, and then make clear that this was not to happen again. _Ever!_

"You should've asked, and I should've gone with you. What if you got lost? Could you find the way back home?" I questioned. Shaking heads all around. Six, I had to remind myself. They were only _six._

"Splinter must be worried sick too, I left him a note asking him to start looking too if I hadn't gotten back by time he came home." I went on, trying to stave away the growing stress headache. I was sixteen, I was meant to be worrying about exams and projects and cute boys, not four six year olds slipping and drowning in a sewer.

Oh yeah, come warm weather again, they are _so_ learning how to swim. I don't care if it takes me all summer I will have them treading water by this time next year. Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to afford arm floaties.

"We're sorry." Mikey whimpered, a mixture of genuine regret and _Oh I didn't know better, I'm the baby of the family!_ That stops, now. I will not allow one of my children to be so spoiled that he thinks he can get out of trouble simply because he's considered youngest.

"Forget about it, for now. But young men you are all _grounded_ until you're _thirty!"_ They could forget about their toys. I was going to drag a toy trunk from the dump and lock everything away. I could spring for a pad lock, and not even _Splinter_ knew how to pick a lock.

You pick up things, living in the bad parts of town. I can also hotwire a car, but I was too chicken to steal it too. Whether or not I ever get a chance to use my knowledge, remains to be seen. If these kids don't kill me first I fully intend to pass on my knowledge. You know, _after_ they get past the age where taking their toys is an effective punishment.

I got the boys back home, and sure enough my note was missing. I made sandwhiches for the boys and ordered them to stay put while I found Splinter. This would be so much easier if we had cell phones. Stupid people not losing money in the sewers often enough. No concern for the hapless mutants.

Two hours later I found Splinter and we got back. We lectured them in turns, so we didn't tire out too soon. I took their toys to my room, since Splinter had their tv. I set them to writing out _I will not scare my mom and dad by leaving without permission again._ The words were long for beginners, but Donnie had it in hand and I left the line for them to copy. I told them to keep doing that until dinner.

Chores appeared the next day as Splinter left, promising to bring back a large trunk. I would buy the pad lock after my afternoon shift. I no longer went to the small park, I went all the way to Central park now. More people, more money, less Felix. Wins all around.

Leo had to clean their room, which involved making the bed and making sure that there weren't any hidden toys. Raphie had to scrub the living room floor, since I had discovered leaving the carpets down for too long allowed the humidity to let _things_ flourish. Don did the dojo, under the mats for the same reason. Mikey cleaned the kitchen, including dishes.

This left me with nothing to fill my morning with, other than yet another practice session. And I couldn't do that since Don was still cleaning and slipping on a wet floor was a sure fire way to experience nastalgia for my early days in training.

So naturally I sat on the couch, marking their progress and stepping in when I felt they were slacking off. There was no way they were getting out of this. And keeping them working got them tired, and kept them quiet, so I didn't have to worry about them sneaking out.

It helped that since they were seperated it was impossible for their usual daily squabbles to break out. Mikey couldn't irritate Raph, Leo couldn't boss Don, Don couldn't annoy them with know-how, Raph couldn't break crayons or hide bouncy balls to earn the ire of his brothers. It was the closest thing to peace and harmony we'd had since they learned how to talk. I for one was going to make the most of it.

"Leola, would you help me?" Splinter called from the door. I made an exaggerated _I'm getting up, woe is me_ noise and meandered to where he was dragging a trunk.

It was definitely big enough to fit all the toys. In fact, it was big enough that it must have warrented a trip around town to get to one of the larger entrances. I did not envy him for having to drag it the whole way here. That thing was a big iron monstrosity.

I put it against the wall of the living room, about a meter off from the grandfather clock. It went a long way towards making the place look more _lived in._ It was big and a boring shade of gray, the same as the tea pot we had actually. I really need to get my hands on some paint, even spray paint will do. That shouldn't be too hard, PDs carried it as par the course these days.

And it was _big._ Easily the same as my arm span, and about as wide as a typical computer desk. It reached midthigh and the lid was heavy, it took all four boys working together to open it. The clasp was in good condition, it hadn't rusted too badly and what was there could be polished off.

It was almost like a funeral as I laid each toy to rest inside it's depths. It kind of _did_ feel like I was burying them. The boys watched, sniffing at a particularly liked one in a way that made me want to take it back. They had to learn that actions had consequences though, and Splinter stood by my decision, though I have a feeling in this instance he was simply so relieved he might have let them get away with just the chores and lines.

I wasn't up to training that evening, so instead I did some minor stretches after bringing back a lock. It was habit more than anything now to train and sometimes I just wanted to hit things. The revolving dummy was better than emulating my father. So I hit it, hard, and often. Moving from one strike, dodge one of the limbs, evade again, strike, step back, come in from the side. A pattern that could be repeated until my body collapsed, but gave my mind plenty of room to stretch.

I couldn't keep them in the lair forever. One day they'd be out there, they had to be able to find their own way back. I had to know that my sons wouldn't slip without someone to catch them. Whether it was another brother or Splinter or me.

I was going to have to let them grow up. One way or another it was going to happen, and I would rather they be prepared and able to get back, then naive and completely innocent, and dead in some back alley. Or worse.

I was going to give myself nightmares. Clearly manual labor wasn't enough to get my mind off today's happenings. I stopped pummeling the dummy, interested to see there were several new bruises along my knuckles. Those were going to turn into very nice shades of purple and yellow.

I worked harder than usual on dinner. It was something I'd been planning for a special occasion, because it took a lot of ingredients, but I made Chili. I set them out in chipped bowls with spoons that had seen better days, but it was a banquet fit for a king.

"...I've been thinking about what happened, and I've made a decision." I announced after we were more or less finished.

"I'll start teaching you boys how to find your way around the sewers, alright?" Their faces lit up, the first smiles I'd seen all day. That made me smile, which convinced Splinter to smile. And we were all smiling and suddenly it was like the plug had been pulled and the boys started _talking._

Which consisted entirely of complaints. About how stinky the sewers were, the chores, not having tv or their toys, and various other little complaints in their day. By getting the conversation rolling I had created a monster. It was never going to end. I was going to have to listen to their whining forever.

I couldn't think of any bedtime stories that night. It seemed I had said it all and told it ten times each already. I had even exhausted the plots of every lesser known disney movie that I had ever seen. So for a long five minutes I tried to think of something new.

Failing that I got out Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone.

Sleep did not come easy. It didn't want to go gentle into that good night. I cajoled it, cursed it, threatened to have it's livers for a really grisly set of garters. It was not fooled.

So, no sleeping. Just sitting there and listening to the deep and patient _tick_ _tock_ of the clock I was regretting getting. It wasn't bad during the day, but at night with no other noises to distract from it, yeah it was bad. I counted to sixty five times before I got up. When I did, I knew I was admitting defeat.

Bushido demands that there not be defeat. Or if there is, you should only use a strategic retreat to regroup and then come back even stronger than before. I admitted my defeat against the sandman, whether or not I would someday turn the tables on him remained to be seen.

Bushido demanded a lot of things actually. Honor, sacrifice, training everyday, it demanded everything. Splinter followed the principles in everything that he did, which gave him the image of a wise old man. Me, I could follow it when it suited me.

But at the end of the day I just had too much pride and ego to ever be an example of Bushido. I would have no problems betraying an ally if I thought they might hurt my family. I had no problems with fighting dirty to get the job done. And in the end, I wondered if it was worth it.

In the end, no one was going to accept _me._ And I looked relatively normal. They would _never_ accept master Splinter or my sons. Always, we would have to hide. Even _I_ hated going out into the sunlight now. It was like I was some nocturnal creature, hissing at the sunlight and all the things that lived in it.

Weren't we as deserving of the sun? Why did we have to live in a place that shunned anything different? What I wouldn't give to be able to let my boys outside to play. To let them meet other kids and make friends, grow up, start families.

I closed my eyes and forced the image out of my mind. I had thought about all of this before. There had been days when I had hated my tail and ears and claws. There had been days, really bad ones, where I almost came to regret being in the sewers that day. Almost.

Eventually I fell asleep on the couch, but time was cruel. I only slept for four hours before it was time for morning practice. And I already knew that no amount of pleading or begging would let Splinter give me a day off.

Throwing the ring of a Kyoketsu-Shoge is an interesting experience. One of the tricks was to throw it low, as in below the belt. Anyone seeing something metal heading towards the crotchal region will automatically catch it. This gives me a tiny window of opportunity in which I have to throw a loop of cord to try and snare their hands.

From there I can dart up the length to give the final blow. And a hit from a blade as sharp as this means that when they go down, they stay down. Permanantly.

Of course, given my sparring partner is Master Splinter, it is very rare that I'm even able to tangle him up. Usually I resort to swinging the blade part around and around, to the sides above my head and down around my feet to try and keep some distance between us. I could do it with the ring end to, and it would be pretty devestating, and less lethal, but that was apparently _too easy_ for the great _ninja master._

The first time I hit Splinter, I clipped his forhead when he was too slow to duck. All I knew is one minute we're dancing across the dojo and then there's blood. Spurting from the cut and staining the hard won mats.

I nearly threw away my kyoketsu then and there. I had never wanted to actually _hurt_ him. I didn't even think I _could!_ He was faster than me, learned faster than me, he was more dedicated! I _shouldn't_ have been able to touch him!

And then I did and I realised that I was very different from the same scavenger who brought home those mats. And that was when the loudest silence, became a sound.


	9. After The Rain, The Ground Is Harder

Disclaimer; I do not own TMNT!

Chapter 9: After The Rain, The Ground Is Harder.

After that I never swung the blade directly at Splinter, the side or near his feet, herding him. But never _at_ him. He talked to me about it, said training accidents were very common. That brought about a whole other can of worms with it.

Christmas passed just like the last one. We 'wrapped' the gifts in color coded ribbons and told the boys that Santa had brought them while they were sleeping for being good. Don asked me if they'd really been good, since they had snuck out twice, and I told him that Santa didn't mind little mistakes. And that's what it was, so long as no one got hurt. A little mistake.

After Christmas came New Year's, and we announced that the boys would begin their training in the morning. Not as early as me or Splinter, mind you, but earlier than they were usually up.

"We gets to be ninjas!" Mikey shouted, running around the table with his orange mask on. I was getting tired just watching him. Strange thing was I didn't remember putting any sugar in his dinner.

"We getta train like you and master Splinter?" Leo beamed, looking like he wanted to join his younger brother.

"That's right." I chuckle, giving him a little noogie.

"We're gonna kick Shell!" Raph vowed, pumping his tiny fist in the air. I felt myself freeze, time seemed to slow down and I just heard the echoes bounce into eternity. Kick shell. Kick shell. Kick shell.

Training accidents are very common. They were going to have their own weapons after they mastered the basics. What sort of weapons? Blades?

They would spar against eachother, not me or Splinter. We could dodge their blows easily, redirect any stray weapon harmlessly. _They_ couldn't. What if Raph got too enthusiastic? What if Donnie slipped? Training accidents are very common.

But what was I going to do? Tell them no, sorry, I changed my mind? That wasn't going to cut it. And Splinter would want to know why, and then he'd argue that they had to learn, to protect themselves from the surface.

So time sped back up and I smiled and reassured Don that it was just about hard work and warned Mikey that he'd have to get up early. I shoved the maternal worry deep down, imagining a trunk in my mind just like the recently unlocked one in the living room. I shoved inside all my doubts and threw away the key.

It wasn't healthy, don't get me wrong. I knew I'd have to deal with the very real possibility that one of my children might get seriously hurt. I had to take that fear and make it work for me, make it motivate me, not rule me. I am a lioness and nothing is going to hurt my cubs!

I remembered the early days of learning High Hells, and I remembered sore ankles and many frustrated groans when his cane tapped me, correcting a stance. In comparison, the ease the kids took to walking without a whisper was amazing. Three days.

Three days was all it took for them to use it with effectiveness. A month to use it as though it were second nature. Their rate of progress was amazing.

I say three days and a month, but I don't really mean them. We couldn't train _everyday._ They were little kids, and as soon as it was clear we had no intention of teaching them complicated katas just yet, they lost interest.

So we'd do a couple days, then they'd taper off. They didn't like waking up early, they were sore, they were _bored._ They had no shortage of things to whine about and I lacked the patience to deal with any of it. I swear Splinter must be a saint or something. Some days I had to leave the dojo because their constant complaining wore at my ears. He just took it all in stride, or rapped them on the heads when they whined too hard.

So really with us constantly skipping a week at a time, it took three actual months before Splinter was satisfied and we could start on the Way of The Losing End Of A Fight. Seeing them land flat on their shells proved very entertaining. It was good stress relief too, although I noticed I had to strain a bit to throw Raph over my shoulder. He was thicker than his brothers, but it was all muscle.

They had an innate advantage on this step of their ninjutsu training. Their shells could absorb most of the impact and for the most part they didn't even come away with bruises. I considered this so unfair I began ambushing them after hours too. Unfortunately it was a lot less satisfying than I had hoped.

It made me violently sick to see how fast they were progressing. So I began upping my own training. I called this next step, The Way of Screwing With Gravity. As you can probably guess from the title, it put a lot of emphasis on not being on the ground.

I spaced out meter high poles, enough that I'd have to leap instead of step. I went through various katas, kicks, punches, guards, sweeps. Then I leapt for a pole just out of reach. For a single second I was in the air, doing what must have been a fairly impressive split kick. And then that second ended, and I was trying to regain my balance on the pole. I must have done a fairly impressive impression of a drunk flightless bird.

I crashed to the mats, and felt very glad that we had them, though they could stand to be a bit thicker. I pushed myself up, fixed the poles I had knocked down, climbed back up, and tried again. I tried all through my individual time while the kids were busy doing their chores. In a few minutes I knew the tv would turn on, and then Splinter would arrive for our match.

"Are you prepared?" He asked, already starting to bow. I return the respectful gesture before answering.

"Always." With that it's on like Donkey Kong. He darts forward, trying to get in range while my ring rips out of my hand, I'm trying to brain him. I swing it in an arch to follow him, using about one/third of it to chase him while my right hands brings out the other one/third to his other side to cut him off. That leaves just one narrow area for him to reach me, and I'm waiting.

Kicks and flips, use my tail to block his. The whisper of cloth and the whistle of his cane in the air. Duck under his swing, which isn't easy since he's so short, and pop back up with an uppercut aimed for his jaw. He flips back to avoid it, acting more like a leaf on the wind than a ninety pound rat.

Now I'm the one chasing, trying to get him tangled in the cord and hit him with the ring at the same time that I'm advancing and he's retreating. My thighs protest when I try for the butterfly kick and miss by miles. My ring is flying into my hand and I absently twirl it on three feet of cord again, trying to work out a strategy.

I told you that me and Splinter are pretty even in the fights. We're learning more or less at the same pace and spend the same amount of time mastering most of the same things. I even mentioned that I have a few advantages, like height and weight. Well now it's a little less even.

And by a little less, of course I mean a gap about the width of the Great Canyon. Even though I'm sixteen, almost seventeen now, even I get bored of doing ninjutsu everyday. So I haven't been practicing as much as I really should. I grew complascent and only did the mandatory two sessions.

As for Splinter, sometimes it seemed his entire existence was training. I guess if I were a rat man too I would take it more seriously, but I can hide what I am. He can't. So when I go topside I'm visible, and I even draw attention to myself. When he's topside, I doubt anyone knows he's there at all.

So he's improved, a lot. Enough that when he charges me again I don't have time to herd him, I have to step backwards to dodge his blows. I try to curl around the force, use it like a bag in the wind to move myself. I grab his arm in a hold that used to win our fights, but he wriggles out of it like some kind of contortionist, performing things I had only just begun attempting.

He jumps about a meter in the air, up and over my head, bounces off the back of my shoulder, and sends me stumbling forward. I whip around, throwing my blade out and totally forgetting what happened when I hurt him. I don't even come close though, he's already moved. In the two seconds it took for me to whip around he had moved to my left, safely out of the way.

Cord is more flexible than chain, and to a certain extent I can manipulate it beyond simply swinging it in an arch. I can make loops and waves go through it to fling at my target. Splinter wasn't just a target though, unlike the nice training dummy I used for these techniques, _he_ moved.

Up and over what should have been a strong blow, wrenching the weapon from my hands to leave me with only hand to hand when he got close and personal. I duck under his high kicks and throw a feint, trying to move him so I can pick up my weapon again. He isn't fooled and I turn the feint into a light blow, that's all I have time for.

And then his hands flash forward in a blur and I'm flat on my back. I just blink at the cieling. Where did all the pretty lights come from?

"Are you alright, Leola?" He asked, offering me his hand. I accept but wince when I realise I must have pulled something in that frantic whip earlier. My wrist is sore.

We bow to each other, my fists clasped and back stinging as a reminder. I didn't know exactly what he'd done, but it had hurt and I had little intention of coming under fire of it a second time. I started making dinner, fried chicked tonight, and thought over the match. Splinter drank tea at the table and the kids were watching cartoons. The hero hour from the sound of things. Mike loved Silver Sentry.

It was warmer weather now, and Splinter or I began checking the lake out at night to see how often people walked by. It was high time the boys learn how to swim, and I couldn't exactly take them to professional lessons. So nighttime sessions would have to do. Although they'd probably be even less eagre to train in the mornings afterward.

That first trip shed _decades_ off my lifespan. The boys were practically bouncing off the walls and making so much noise I was sure that someone _had_ to hear, had to _turn their heads_ and see my sons and _scream._ I shushed them at least a dozen times with little affect and I gave up, only looking and praying that we could pass unnoticed with our flimsy disguise.

The boys were dressed in scavenged clothes and caps and gloves. Heavy enough that it restricted their movement, and thus their ability to _run_, but hopefully enough that the casual glance might not notice anything strange. Even Splinter was dressed for the occasion, in a trench coat and a fedora hat that made him look like a mafia member in Italy.

It was late when we started out, and I was sure that every person had to have noticed how strange we were. They had to _see_ the green skin and fur! It was so obvious!

Like I said, that first trip shed decades. And I had far too many nightmares to pretend we were on a casual stroll.

The park was empty, and I stood watch while Splinter and the boys shed their clothes. He led them to the water, let them play and splash as they were unable to do in our shower. Two in the morning and all was well.

They'd been forced to take a nice long nap earlier so they could stay awake for the lesson. If nothing else, the cold water definitely woke them up. I didn't envy them the swim. I was perfectly fine here on dry land, thank you very much.

No one was entering from what I could see. No cameras hiding, no hobos sleeping on a bench, which made sense. The nights were warmer, definitely, but not warm enough to abandon alleys that could block some of the wind just yet. Another month and they'd be out here, but for now we were uninterrupted.

We didn't have floaties or life jackets. But Splinter and I were keeping an eye on them as they explored the water. Turtles are semi-aquatic, at least some of them were, and the way the kids took to the waves made me wonder again what species they had been originally. I searched my memory but there was nothing, no defining marks that could spell out the name. Not that I would have recognized such a sign, I'm no expert on reptiles.

Mikey took to it the easiest, which he did to everything that didn't require him to sit and _think._ He had a lot of problems remembering what orders numbers came in, until I showed him how to play jacks. Then he started catching up and surpassing Leo and Raph in maths class. Not Donnie, learning things from the book was where he _thrived,_ but Mike could learn something once he was able to _move_ and do it.

I suspected he had a mild case of ADHD, but I don't know enough about it to be sure. As far as I knew it was used to describe kids who'd rather being on the playground than curled up with a good book.

Behind him came Leo, then Raph, then Don. That had been the way with the ninjutsu lessons too. Mikey was naturally talented in the athletic department, but because he was talented he didn't see much point in continued practice of the same thing. That's why it was so hard to get him to walk with the High Hells method, he didn't see why he had to be able to do it _all_ the time after he did it in practice.

Leo was different. He wasn't amazingly talents, but he _practiced_ and that kept him even with Mike. Even now I saw him doing the doggie paddel again although Mike had only gone through the motions before skipping straight to the back stroke. He had mastered the walking method first, and used it all the time, even when he thought he was alone.

Raph wasn't doing too badly, but there was the unmistakable knowledge that he didn't want to do this. I could see him getting angry and frustrated while his brothers figured it out and he was stuck still trying not to flail out of control when he couldn't touch the bottom anymore. He _would_ get it, once he calmed down and started thinking of it more like a game and less like a challenge.

Don, he didn't leave the shallows. He walked to his tiny waist and splashed a bit, but he didn't want to get in the water. Splinter noticed and talked to him, promising he was safe and that he was there to catch him. It wasn't that Don was scared though, and it wasn't that he wasn't _interested._

I wasn't sure what it was, so when he got out while everyone else was getting to the deeper parts, I did one more check that we were alone before I stepped down and took a seat beside him.

"Hey Donnie, want to talk?" I asked, smiling and trying to throw out _motherly_ vibes. It's harder than it seems. How do moms make it look so easy?

"The water's cold." He grumbled, rubbing goose bumps out of his legs. I gave him his purple towel and then pulled him onto my lap. It was easy to forget that the boys were cold blooded, they were affected by temperature. Getting too cold might put them into hibernation. Or something similar at least.

"Better?" I questioned, hugging him tight so he could share my body heat. Our home had a heater, which we would all converge on in the early morning hours.

"Uh-huh." He nodded, snuggling deeper. I checked out that we were alone, all safe. Splinter was trying to stop Raph from drowning Mikey.

"...I'm sleepy, can I sleep now?" Something was off about the way he said it, but I let him, holding him and watching for anyone trying to intrude on my family.

Don didn't say things like 'uh-huh' and 'sleepy'. He said 'yes' and 'tired'. I frowned and tried to figure out why that bothered me. He was a kid, and kids said things like that. _I_ said things like that.

Except this was my genius son who hated bad grammar and loved reading and learning new words. And that stuck to me for the rest of the hour we were there before we slunk off with exhausted children in tow.

Splinter and I indulged them by sleeping with them that night, letting them have our body heat after the cold waters. I usually had Raph hugging me at night, or Mikey. Tonight though Don stuck to me like glue, and I had a feeling he was trying to draw more than just _warmth_ from me.

Body warmth didn't always cut it though, and by morning it was obvious we had three budding cases of the flu. Worse, Splinter was one of the ones to fall sick. Raph and Mikey had a fever too, and I put them all together in the boy's room on the queen mattress to stop Don and Leo from getting sick too.

We didn't have enough medicine to treat them all, and they needed to constantly be drinking water and there had to be at least two buckets by the bed. It wasn't enough. I had to go topside, and find some more medicine. Except money was a bit of a problem, since I had gone grocery shopping just last week I was running pretty low. Street performing didn't bring in much.

We got through times of hunger before though, during our early days. Got through that visit to Japan with the stalker bone ghost. And that was scary. They had even helped me personally get through Felix, helped me realize that being lonely wasn't a good enough excuse to be around guys like him.

Funny thing about hard times, you think there's no possible way to get through them, but you keep trying anyway. Because that's your _friend_ who's sick, your _children_ hurting. So you wait for the storm to pass and then you pound pavement.


	10. All Medicines Are Poison

Disclaimer; I don't own TMNT!

Chapter 10: All Medicines Are Poison.

We didn't have the money we needed, and no time to try to earn it. Flu didn't usually kill, but it could. I knew that, it was the reason flu shots were such a big deal. People had to go to the hospital sometimes, if they kept throwing up all their fluids they got dehydrated. I couldn't take Splinter or Raph and Mikey to a hospital though, and I didn't have an IV.

No IV, no money, no medicine. Man this day just keeps getting better and better!

Stealth lessons came in pretty damn handy. I was on a rooftop, my heart bouncing up and down my throat every time I leapt over air, but I kept moving. Stayed in the shadows even. I just had to find an open bathroom window. I had to find a medicine cabinet.

I couldn't take everything from one place though, those people might need the medicine too. So even when I took some tums from one building I was already running for another. When I had everything I could get, I returned to the burrow.

"Mom!" Don cried when he saw me. He was just outside the door, dumping out one of the buckets. I remembered the thing about the IV and hoped the medicine would help.

"I brought medicine." I told Splinter, handing him a glass of water and helping him sit up. Leo was helping Mikey and Don was trying to wake up Raph.

"Thank you." He coughed. I winced at how long the fit lasted. He was puffing by the time it stopped. There wasn't anything I could do about it, save pound his back a couple times and hand him a couple pills.

It's hard to watch your children sick and trembling, and completely unable to get them the help they deserved. After a couple days Leo fell sick, and then it was just me and Don.

I went to get more medicine a couple times, and I helped master Splinter and the boys try to keep it down when I got home. It seemed to me like nothing could possibly make this any worse, unless Don or I got sick too. Then again I pride myself on having a good immune system, and I do try to stay clean and warm.

It was too early in spring, the water had been too cold. The boys were _cold blooded_ of course they'd get sick! Splinter was old too, he might not have gotten sick if he'd been younger. And the flur was contagious, the boys had never been sick before, their immune systems weren't able to fight it off as well.

So I had to work at least twice as hard to do the things that needed doing. I spent the last of our money on cans of soup, I raided more bathrooms for pills, and when I could I tried to practice, tried not to fall apart completely when my family needed me.

Don was a very good helper. He could help so much by cleaning out the buckets and giving them water while I was gone. Then when I was here he slept like the dead until a particularly loud moan would rouse him.

"Mom, when will they get better?" He asked me, restraining himself from yawning. There were dark bruises under his eyes to show the lack of sleep. I wanted to pick him up like he was a recently mutated toddler again.

"I don't know Donnie." I sighed, patting the spot next to me on the couch. He didn't waste a moment before climbing up beside me.

"I've been thinking," He started, stopped. I watched as he bit his lip, like he was trying to figure out the likelihood of me laughing at him for whatever he said next.

And he _had_ been thinking. About just about anything that crossed his fancy. I guess when the body was busy emptying buckets and filling cups of water the mind had plenty of time to wander. I said once that Don was a genius, or maybe I've mentioned it a lot more, but nothing had really come of it.

Then he began asking me _questions._ Nothing warranting a talk of the birds and bees, but nothing much easier unfortunately. I explained as best I could about why we couldn't take our family to a hospital like in the cartoons he watched, why being so sick was such a bad thing. He asked me about dehydration and hygeine. Especially hygeine.

I admit, Splinter and I were pretty slack about that. I mean, we didn't even have toothbrushes. Honestly I had lost mine a long time ago, and the boys were _turtles_, I knew they had teeth, it just sort of slipped my mind that they needed to be brushed too.

I make a horrible mother. Baths aren't too good either, the shower is cold so we don't usually stay in any longer than it takes to get off the first layer of dirt and wash hair. Which, admittedly for Splinter, takes a while. He has a lot of hair.

Slowly, one by one they got over the flu. The boys bounced back and were running around and yelling while Splinter was still confined to bed. He was better, much better than the first few days, but he still coughed and felt way too warm. I have to tell you, it was murder getting them to be quiet and let him rest.

Don's many questions had led me to look for things I normally didn't. I still didn't have any money, so toothbrushes and such were still out, but there were things I _could_ get. You know, if I was creative. And if there's one thing, anything, I'm good at, it's being creative.

The soaps that the hotels leave for you in bathrooms? Those cutesy ones that are shaped like sea shells? I gathered up a whole bushel of them, still unwrapped, very easily.

See, all I had to do was wear dark clothes, that at first glance looked like the uniform, and walk through the employee door. There I walked down the hall until I found a supply closet. Inside, clean towels, soap, tiny shampoos, and best of all, toothbrushes and paste.

It was like christmas had come early. I gathered them up and then walked into a door that had been left open. No guests or anything, but I didn't pause long enough to be caught. I just went straight to the window and clambered out. On the roof I bagged them into my backpack, brought along for the ride, and continued my mission.

I put on my red cap and a stained jean jacket when I entered my next stop. It was a small time repair shop that sold spare parts. There was also this place in the corner that had a bunch of broken things that couldn't be fixed, or had been fixed but no one had come to pick up.

"Hey buddy, what'cha going to do with that stuff on the table?" I asked one burly guy. He had oil up to his elbows from working on a car, it was cherry red but that's all I could tell of it. I was never a fan of cars. Can't drive anyway.

"Hmm? You can take anything with a yellow tag on it, that's getting thrown away at the end of the week." He mumbled, looking at where I was pointing. There were a _lot_ of yellow tags.

There was this old car, not a real one but a toy, that definitely looked like it had seen better days. It was missing all it's doors and a back wheel, along with the hood. I picked it up and slid it into the bag, along with a model bike with tires about the same size. Then came other nuts and bolts of the sort.

Finding tools was harder, but I managed after a couple of days. Two screwdrivers, different kinds. One with a flat head and one with that little X design thing. A canister of some tiny screws, a hammer, and some wires. Electrical tape wasn't found, alas, but I did not lose hope.

Don's face lit up like the fourth of july when I unveiling my presents. I had bits and parts of other things too, anything technology-ish that I thought he could amuse himself by tinkering with. I wish I could've gotten him some actual books on the subject, but I had to make do and I tried to be sure he didn't do anything dangerous without me around.

Splinter continued regaining strength, and it seemed my little vacation from training would be over and done with. I panicked at that, afraid he would accuse me of slacking off, which I had. I threw myself into training as much as I could, blindfolded even. There's just something about a disappointed teacher that has always rubbed me wrong.

His fever broke and his cough spluttered and finally died. By now all the boys were brimming with health and looking forward to having their father around again.

I hadn't played favorites with Don, in case it came off like that. I got things for the others too. It just took a lot longer.

They all had things that they liked to do, and from watching them I did my best to cater to those things. Take my baby, Mikey, for instance. It had taken him the longest to catch on to reading and writing, but once he had it, he ran with it. He loved story time the best, and was always begging for more. Story books wound up on the street a lot, and a trip to the dump helped me locate a good number of pencils and pens that still had ink.

"Ah, welcome back young Leola." Professor was one of the homeless guys living in a shanty town there. I had once thought of staying here, plenty of homeless did, but I haven't regretted my decision. Besides, they all stank to high heavens and a good amount of them did drugs. Sometimes, I even had to wonder about the professor. Even though he was one of the only humans I interacted with these days.

"Hey professor, how are things?" I wave and jog over. Everyone here except the professor is usually high, and I can almost smell the pot in the air, so I figure it's safe to let my tail hang free. My ears are out and the wind blows them all around.

"Very good lately, although I theorize that I will grow fat from eating all these cakes alone." His eyes twinkled as he showed me a box of donuts. It was already half empty and I could tell they were stale, but I before I could turn them down, they needed it more than me, he shoved the box into my hands.

"I am sure your sons would love a treat." I smiled and shook my head, accepting it and putting the box under one arm. He knew I had sons, and that I lived with someone who helped take care of them, but he didn't know that they were turtles or the man a rat. Sometimes I wanted to introduce him to Splinter, I think they'd like eachother and Professor never stared at my tail.

"Thank you, professor." I'm sure he has a name. Everyone has a name, even the homeless. It's just that he doesn't tell anyone. His moniker, Professor, came about from his numberless theories.

"Professor, I don't suppose you'd know where I could find paper, do you?" I ask. Searching the dump takes a long time, and the moon is starting to sink. It's early, rather than late.

"Newspapers?" He askes. I shake my head, explaining that I need more paper for my sons to write on.

"Paper, I cannot help with. However, I did notice some old computers in a far corner." I didn't know what he was thinking I could do with broken computers, but I followed anyway.

"Here is a little booklet that tells what all the pieces do." I was stunned. Not an hour later and I was loading down the wagon with computer parts, a monitor, a harddrive thing, a tower, and other miscellaneous pieces that I had no idea what to do with. And finally he finishes off the night by giving me a 'booklet' that tells what all the parts are.

"Um, thank you!" I stammer. You could've knocked me down, for all my training, with a feather. I had no idea what to do with all these, and I thought myself pretty well educated. You know, for a drop out.

"Not at all Leola, I'm sure your sons will be able to type on this quite well." If we got it working. All I knew about computers were the on button and making a password. I didn't usually use one except for school, how was I to be expected to fix one? And Donnie was a genius, but he was still a kid!

Evidently a kid with far too much time on his hands though. He devoured the book, putting pieces next to each other to compare them and tinkering with the little wires.

I had found some paper with clean sides, and I happily let Mikey write story after story. Some newly dried out construction paper and markers let Leo explore his inner artist. And a walkman that had been abandoned in the park gave Raphie a whole new world of music. Lost and founds are awesome!

Donnie was the one who began to shine though. Always the quietest of his brothers, the most logical, the smartest, but now he really began to stand out. He had fixed the car to run again, although it was still missing doors and a hood, and now he worked steadily on the computer.

Splinter was up again and we began training together. I had missed our spars, but not landing on my face. That part I could do without. Alas, twas not meant to be.

March turned to April, and then May, and we were getting set to try swimming again. Don completed the computer, and after the first week of the boys taking turns and fighting over how long they got to be on it, he began helping with other things.

One of the worse things about our burrow was the heater. We didn't know how to turn it _off._ So we were grateful during winter, but when spring and summer began creeping up on us I would sweat and mentally curse the humming machine. Cold showers became a sweet release, and that's when Don began tinkering with it, as he had the computer before it.

When he began work by turning it into a boiler, I admit I played favorites a bit. I whooped and gave him an extra donut or some other treat, and bragged about my genius son. I was so proud of him and what he was learning to do. I didn't notice how my other sons began to mistake a bit of praise, for shoving all my love onto just one boy.

"Come on Brainiac! It's not fair!" Splinter was out foraging for food for the day. We were running low and my acts didn't bring in enough money to get everything we needed. I heard Raph's yell and the nickname that Don hard garnered and sighed. This was the third blowout today, and not just from Raph. Leo and Mikey had their share too.

Normally I'm of the opinion that unless they start fighting, it's okay to hang back. I let them argue it out and if it gets bad I step in and enforce apologies and time outs. My ears trained on them over the sound of me washing the dishes. I hadn't had to step in yet, but I was starting to wonder why everyone was ganging on him today.

"Raph, I have my own chores! Do your own!" I heard Don reply. He sounded very frustrated. I knew he too must be wondering whether or not it was national Gang On Donnie Day. I put down the dish I had just rinsed and dried my hands.

"You think you're so much better just cause Ma likes the shower? Well you're not!" I was shocked. I didn't think they minded my rewarding Don a bit. I hardly ever got to before because he was so quiet, it was the first time he had ever excelled at something and I wanted to encourage it.

I listened to music with Raph, I pinned Leo's drawings on the fridge, and I had even begun reading Mike's stories at bedtime. I had given them treats too, I thought I'd been fair.

"I don't!" I winced as I heard Don's voice crack. He didn't cry as often as Mikey did, but he was still a sensative little guy. In contrast Leo and Raph hardly ever so much as sniffled. I started to walk to the door, thinking I had better nip this in the bud.

"Just go away!" I heard Raph yell. Then I heard running feet and the front door open and close. They knew how to find their way home again, but I still didn't like them going off alone. I rounded on my second Son.

"Raphael." He jumped at the sound of his full name. Splinter usually stuck to full names, so normally you had to pay closer attention to _how_ he said it if you wanted to tell if the kids were in trouble. I was easier. I just went full name or bust.

"Uh, yeah Ma?" He gulped, turning around. He looked like he wished he could still pull his head into his shell.

"You know better than to tell your brothers to go away Raphael." I stated, trying not to be too angry. I had to go and make sure Don didn't get hurt or see if he just needed a hug.

"But, he's always showing off." I heard him grumble. Before I could get to Don though, I owed one of my sons an apology of my own.

"Raph, I love you. I love _all_ of you, not just Don." I told him, pulling him close so I could get in a hug. He wasn't much for mushy stuff, but it wasn't hard to cuddle him a bit. He humored me.

"I _know,_ but-! It makes me so mad when he shows us up!" There was a temper in him, that was clear. Still, I had to make a few things clear.

"Raph, you're good at being strong and you like music, right?" He nodded, not sure where I was going with this. Truth be told, neither did I.

"Well, Don is good at learning things, and he likes machines. You don't practice on the punching bag just to make someone else happy, you do it because _you_ like to, right?" Another nod, more sure of himself this time.

"Well, Don is happy when he's tinkering." He slumped, but I think he understood where I was going.

"Leo, Mikey, and Don don't get mad when you're stronger. So you shouldn't get mad when Don's smarter, or Mikey's faster, or that Leo draws better." I let him out of my hug but I kept my hands on his shoulders.

"But, I do get mad." He complained. I knew that too. He always had been the most agressive turtle. I sighed and held back the urge to bluntly explain why it wasn't right to take his anger out on others, that he'd eventually get a taste of his own medicine. At the time though, I was well and truly _sick_ of pills.


	11. Children Grow Up, With or Without Us

A/N: I'm getting some good feedback about this. And I've gotten a question about me continuing straight up into one of the shows. Yes, I fully intend to take them that far, maybe farther. I've no set series in mind, I think I'll just take the parts I like and mash them together. It'll probably be mainly 2k3 though, since that's the one I know the best.

Disclaimer: This is awfully repetitive and no one ever seems to care. This is the last one I'm putting up. I don't own TMNT!

Chapter 11: Children Grow Up, With Or Without Their Parents.

Finding Don was a lot easier than I had feared. He hadn't gone far, and in fact I think he was turning around to come home when I caught up with him. He took one look at me and _flinched._ That...it hurt. I don't want my children to flinch like that when I walk up to them. I'm their mother, and I would never hurt them.

"Hey, do you want to talk?" I ask, kneeling down in front of him and smiling, quietly, like the smile is a secret between him and me.

"Why's everyone mad at me for helping?" He asked helplessly. It takes a lot to make Donatello angry, like Mikey he's more of the opinion that things happen and life marches on. He looked mad though. I think, if the only reason he trained at all wasn't for me, Splinter, or his brothers, he wouldn't fight at all. He's the kind of guy I can picture being happy with his calm machines, keeping the peace through less direct means than Leonardo.

"Their jealous." I answer honestly. I don't approve of lying, even little white lies. And I certainly don't want to say that they wouldn't understand or something. Their all smart, yes even Mikey, and not being given a reason would worry them more than the reason themselves. I'm still a kid too, I know how that feels.

"They're not as smart as you, so they get angry. It's not your fault." He sniffed and anger drained away. I smiled a little brighter and took him to a part of the sewer junction where we could sit and swing our legs over the side. I kept one arm around his shoulder, just in case.

"How do I get them to stop being mean then?" He asked.

"Simple, you talk to them, tell them you don't like how they're behaving. If that doesn't work, tell them that you won't listen to them anymore. If they've got nothing but hurtful things to say, then they shouldn't get a chance to say them." I told him. He smiled a bit and we started back home. Now I just had to pull Leo and Mikey aside to talk to them and hopefully put this whole thing to rest.

"Mom?" I looked down at where I was holding his hand.

"When we get back, do you think they'd help me make a new car?" I chuckled and told him I didn't see why not.

I did talk to Leo and Mikey. I held off on any punishments and talked to Splinter after he was through teaching me The Way of Failing To Hit Whatever I Was Aiming For. I think he's rather unamused by my many creative nicknames for his lessons. Shuriken throwing looks so much easier on tv.

"Leola, there is a matter I wish to speak with you about." He announced as I tried to regain my breath after being knocked flat on my bum for the second time in as many minutes.

"Well, I am a captive audience." I panted, referencing my current position as being held down by the point of his cane. Stupid stick thing, it shouldn't hurt that bad to get hit by a stick.

"I believe we should begin showing the boys how to scavenge for supplies, at least in the sewers." It would really help if the boys pitched in a bit, and as long as they _stayed_ in the sewers, I had no problems with it. I said as much too.

"I will take Leonardo with me tomorrow morning then." He nodded. He always did things like this by order of age. Personally I did it by eenie meanie miney mo, but I'm not going to tell _him_ that.

"I'll take Mikey in the afternoon then." It was going to cut into performance time, but there wasn't much I could do about it. It had been raining all week but the weatherman said we were in for a nice dry patch. That left plenty of floating debris in the sewer waters.

The boys were excited to learn of our plans, I helped by making it seem less like work and more like a scavenger hunt. Mostly we needed cloth and recyclables that I could sell or reuse at home.

"Are we going topside?" Mikey asked at breakfast, he was eating so fast I was half afraid he'd choke. Doing the heimlech on a turtle would be needlessly complicated. Not that I know how to do the heimlech in the first place. I'd probably make things worse.

"No, absolutely not." I said firmly, stomping on the idea. Topside seemed more and more like a mythical land of dreams to the boys. The promised land maybe, or maybe something similar to Area 51. Something to dream about, be forbidden from, and strive towards. It hurt that I'd never be able to show them the world I had come from.

"Aw!" It came from all around the table. Every little turtle slumped in their seats and started pushing their cereal around their bowls. I had just killed the enthusiastic mood.

"My sons, the surface is far too dangerous for you." Splinter backed me up at least. I'd hate to be the _only_ bad guy.

Leo and Splinter left a few minutes later, and despite the adventure we'd denied them there was an undoubtable feeling of excitement when they left. Leo had tied his blue mask on tight and was standing just as tall as he could. He was just tickled pink to be picked to leave the lair with his father for the first time ever.

I got the remaining boys to focus on their morning excercises, taking no small pleasure in watching them lose their balance. They had shells to protect them though, so it wasn't as satisfying as I'd hoped.

Lunch time came sooner than anticipated. With it came the return of Leo and Splinter. Something was wrong, I knew it the minute Leo walked in with his head slightly bowed and only half heartedly telling his brothers all about what he'd done. I tried to catch Splinter's eye but he had something else on his mind.

"Splinter?" After lunch and before I left with Mikey I pulled him aside.

"Leola, I believe Leonardo harbors a fear of heights." Well, that wasn't what I was expecting. That at least explained why Leo was acting weird. He was probably embarassed and worried about his brothers teasing him. They hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary though.

Oh, to be six years old and hopelessly naive again. Why didn't I savor it the first time?

"Take Michelangelo out, I will handle this." I sighed and nodded, going to meet Mikey at the door. Splinter had handled my fear of hurting him during training, mostly be making it very clear that I _couldn't_, so he could probably handle a simple height thing easy.

"Ready Mikey?" I ask, handing him a cloth sack. It probably used to be a potato sack. Or maybe one of those bags bank robbers use to hold their loot.

"Yes Ma'am!" He giggled, giving me a salute. I returned it and we closed the door behind us.

"Alright Mikey, we just had a lot of rain, so the water's high and fast. Be careful not to be pulled in." I lectured while we got to walking. He either ignored or didn't hear me because he ended up reaching to far for some brown cloth and almost lost his footing. I gripped the edge of his shell and pulled him, and the tarp, back to dry land.

"Oops!" He chuckled, trying to look oh so innocent. I gave him my best amused-but-not-impressed look.

Splinter's idea of 'handling it' obviously differed from mine. I don't know if it's a japanese thing or a rat thing. I'm leaning towards rat personally. Sure, Leo's a little trooper, but making him walk across poles while blindfolded, when he hasn't mastered the Way of Balance yet? I anticipated many bruises, even if these poles were only a few inches high.

Days went on, we took the boys out one at a time, teaching them how to find their way home again. I got a hold of a map of the sewers and showed the boys all the neat pipes that were nearly dry in low tide and which ones entirely under water. Splinter showed them how to not leave muddy tracks, I showed them how to tell when maintenance men were working. The lessons were pretty thourough.

And as days went, I learned new things beside master Splinter. The Way of Invisibility, or as I like to call it, The Way of Getting The Cookie From The Cookie Jar, was a lot of fun to learn. I'd been given the basic stealth regiment, you know, stick to the shadows, don't look people in the eye, take the high road 'cause people have this weird aversion to looking up. This was cool though.

Behold my awesome sneaky power! I can now catch my children shirking on their chores without them knowing! I think they're convinced I have eyes on the back of my head!

The boys learned the basic katas on the poles. Leo still got extra lessons in blindfolded pole-dancing, and the poles crept higher. He never realized that they got higher, Splinter or myself would pick him up and place him on them so he couldn't tell. He did pretty well, I was halfway convinced Splinter had been mistaken when he said Leo had a fear of heights. Or maybe Leo got over it.

And then he reached mastery, which involved poles that almost touched the ceiling and the tarp Mikey and I had saved strung out like a net. I insisted on the net. The poles were _really_ high and I don't _care_ if Leo's got some sort of amazing sense of balance he's still a little kid and little kids should _not_ be up that high without a safety net!

"Now my son, remove your blindfold." Splinter ordered, smiling proudly up at his little protoge. Leo fixed his mask back around so he could see and then he...well he froze. Just looked down and _turned into an ice-cicle!_

"Leo, it's okay baby!" I called, trying not to show how nervous I was, trying to act all confident that he'd be okay. Did I tie those knots good enough?

" !" He cried as he panicked and began flailing. I flinched when he lost his footing and watched him fall. The net held, which was good because it had been _my_ turn to freeze in fear.

"That is enough for today my son, go and play." Splinter sighed, dismissing us both. I helped Leo to his feet and we bowed, I kept my hand on his shoulder as I led him to the kitchen. If anyone deserved a stale cookie, it was Leo.

"Feeling better?" I asked when he wiped away the sugar. The stove I had sometimes went on the blink but I did manage to make some sugar cookies a couple days ago.

"Why can't I do it?" He asked me, slumping at my reminder.

"Don't take it too badly, you're doing better than I did!" I pointed out. I still remember all the bruises and spills I took. Admittedly _now_ I can jump across buildings in a single bound, without really looking, but even I still take a tumble.

"I am?" He asked. Kids always assume that their parents are infallible. We don't make mistakes, we're just all that and a bag of chips. Most kids don't learn the error of this belief until they're teenagers. I have to let Leo learn when he's hardly six.

"I _still_ fall down when I try to do backflips because I'm afraid of falling on my head." It's sad, but painfully true.

"Really?" Ah, to be six years old with all knowing parents again.

Well I don't know if it helped much but he went to the living room and left me to get lunch ready. I was looking over our options for dinner when Michelangelo came in and asked for two onions.

"Why?" I asked. Food was not something to be wasted, they knew that.

"I'm hungry!" He tried to convince me, clutching his stomach. Mikey knew better than to play with his food, bottomless pit that he is, so I gave them to him. I don't like onions anyway, they stink.

I was curious though, so I followed him using the Way of Getting The Cookie From The Cookie Jar. He went to the living room and stopped in front of a frozen Leonardo. Not frozen like on the poles, more standing-in-place because of a game of freeze-tag frozen. He had his arms outstretched and one leg up in a crane-style kata. What was Mikey doing with those onions?

I could smell it from here. Satisfied that the onions hadn't gone to waste, and hoping Mikey could cajole Leo into a better mood, I went back to trying to decide what I was making for dinner.

The thump and "Oh, was I bothering you?" let me know Mikey got what he deserved.

Dinner was a lively affair, what with Raph being oh so proud of bringing home an _unopened_ pack of loose leaf lined paper. It was awesome, all clean and new. Apparently some careless student had dropped it in the gutter and never bothered retrieving it. I announced the continuation of writing lessons for the next day, promising ten sheets to each turtle for personal use.

Splinter took out Leo again, sharing with me a plan to get rid of his fear once and for all. I wanted to come along but I knew that this was too important for an overprotective mama to participate. I'd want to baby him, and kiss it all better. He didn't need that.

Mikey's actually pretty good at writing. He especially likes writing new stories and I think when he gets a little better I'll start reading them at story time. Today he wrote a story about a brave super hero named Turtle Titan, who saved people left, right, and center even on his bad days. The hero's mask was blue.

It's warmer weather now, and we again try to teach the boys how to swim. This time I take part to help Donnie through. He's a little braver when I'm there to catch him when he falls. No one got sick, and we made sure to always have a supply of medicine just in case. The first time Don crosses the little pond all on his own we celebrate.

Rather than mocking his slow pace his brothers help him along. Raph shouts encouragements, Mikey demonstrates ways to preserve strength, Leo provides unflinching support. It's a far cry from just a month ago.

"They are growing up." Splinter sighs as we watch the boys splash in the water. They're quiet, for boys having a water fight, and with us grown ups on watch there's not much danger.

"I don't know why, but I thought it would take longer." I chuckle, watching Raph hold Mikey's head underwater. Leo and Don team up to force Raph down in turn, letting Mikey catch his breath.

Children grow up, and even when I hang one of Leo's paintings on the fridge or help Mikey build whole cities with his blocks, I'm watching time slip away. I want to have the ultimate pause button, so I can just stay here when they're little and need me. I know Splinter feels the same way, but he's more accepting of it. I guess having a rat's instincts make it easier to let go to your children's childhood.

Even when I'm helping Don fix a toy, or showing Raph how to punch so he doesn't hurt himself, I'm watching them grow up. Even when I'm not watching too, especially then. When I turn around, that's when it seems to happen the most.

When you turn around, don't you know  
That is when the children grow.


End file.
